WASHINGTON — In what environmentalists hailed as a victory for efforts to curb climate change, an appeals panel in Washington on Thursday rebuffed efforts to delay enforcement of President Barack Obama’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions until legal challenges are resolved.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued an order denying requests for a stay that would have barred the Environmental Protection Agency from implementing the Clean Power Plan.
The plan has been challenged by more than two dozen states, including by Colorado’s Attorney General Cynthia Coffman, and allied business and industry groups tied to fossil fuels. The states deride the carbon-cutting plan as an “unlawful power grab” that will kill coal-mining jobs and drive up electricity costs. Thursday’s order allows federal regulation of carbon emissions pending the court’s review of the case, set for June 2. Implementation of the rules is considered essential to meeting emissions-reduction targets in a global climate agreement signed in Paris last month.
