A Trump-appointed judge who declined to freeze EPA’s greenhouse gas rule for the power sector will be part of the three-member panel that will hear oral arguments over the regulation next month.
Judge Neomi Rao will join Obama-appointed Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan and Judge Brad Garcia, a Biden pick, to hear oral arguments on the rule Dec. 6, according to the calendar for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Rao was part of a separate panel of judges in July who rejected requests from Republican-led states and industry to freeze the EPA rule limiting emissions from the nation’s second-largest greenhouse gas source pending the outcome of a legal challenge against the regulation.
EPA is aiming to control planet-warming pollution primarily through the use of carbon capture and storage technology on new gas- and existing coal-fired power plants. West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey (R) and other opponents of the rule claim the technology remains too unproven to be deployed at the scale envisioned by the Biden administration’s 2024 rule.
