A federal appeals court is giving EPA a second chance to justify its rule targeting smog-forming pollution that crosses state lines after the Supreme Court froze the regulation in June.
In an unsigned order issued Thursday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rebuffed arguments by Republican-led states and industry groups that the rule should be tossed out altogether.
The court instructed EPA to respond to concerns raised by challengers — and the Supreme Court — about the “good neighbor” rule’s severability, or the impact to the program after several states dropped out of it.
In a 5-4 ruling in June, the majority of the Supreme Court’s justices found that EPA had not adequately explained how its good neighbor rule would work after courts stopped implementation in more than half of the 23 states originally covered in the program.
