The administration of US President Joe Biden has suffered a significant blow, as the country's highest court has ruled that the country's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did not have the authority to limit emissions that contribute to climate change across whole states.
The court sided with 19 conservative states and fossil fuel companies in a case against the EPA brought by West Virginia. In its 6-3 ruling, the court said that only Congress, not the EPA, has the power to create a broad system of cap-and-trade regulations to limit emissions from existing power plants.
Biden called the ruling a "devastating decision" but said that it will not undermine his administration's efforts to curb climate change and reach the goal to completely cut all carbon emissions from power plants by 2035 and reduce the country’s overall emissions by half by 2100.
The EPA called the Supreme Court's decision "disheartening", but said that it remains...