Pa., others sue EPA on warming

Officials in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and 15 other states sued the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency yesterday to try to force it to comply with a Supreme Court ruling that rebuked the Bush administration for inaction on global warming.

In their petition, the plaintiffs said the 5-4 ruling in April 2007 required the EPA to decide whether to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions, including carbon dioxide, from motor vehicles.

The EPA has instead done nothing, they said.

"The EPA's failure to act in the face of these incontestable dangers is a shameful dereliction of duty," Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley said.

The petition asks the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to require the EPA to act within 60 days.

In last year's decision, the Supreme Court ruled the EPA had the authority to regulate emissions from new cars and trucks under the Clean Air Act, and said the reasons the EPA gave for declining to do so were insufficient.

EPA spokesman Jonathan Shradar said the Supreme Court required the agency to evaluate how it would regulate greenhouse-gas emissions from cars and other vehicles but set no deadline.

The EPA plans to include the evaluation in a broader look at how to best regulate all greenhouse-gas emissions, not just those from vehicles, he said. Otherwise, a mash of laws and regulations could emerge rather than the "holistic" approach the administration favors.

"We want to set a good foundation to build a strong climate policy of potential regulation and laws we can work toward and actually see some success," Shradar said.