By Jonathan Stempel<\/p>\n
July 2 (Reuters) – A divided federal appeals court on Thursday upheld a ban covering four Los Angeles-area counties on the manufacture, \u200csale and installation of various appliances that emit nitrous oxides, rejecting claims \u200cby appliance makers and trade groups that the pollution control measure conflicted with federal law.<\/p>\n
\u2022 In \u200ba 2-1 decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said nothing in the text and history of the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act suggested that Congress intended to block states from using reasonable means to regulate appliance emissions.<\/p>\n
\u2022 The South \u200cCoast Air Quality Management District passed \u2060the zero-emissions rule for large water heaters, small boilers and process heaters in June 2024 to address the nation’s worst smog, \u2060and comply with ozone standards under the federal Clean Air Act.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Compliance deadlines began taking effect on January 1, and the rule is expected to eliminate nearly 10% \u200bof emissions \u200bin the South Coast Air Basin, which \u200bincludes large portions of Los \u200cAngeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.<\/p>\n
\u2022 The National Association of Home Builders, and several California manufacturing, lodging and restaurant groups were among the entities challenging the rule. Their lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Circuit Judge Lucy Koh wrote for a 2-1 majority that voiding the rule would amount to \u200can implied repeal of the Clean Air Act, \u200band opponents didn’t show that Congress clearly intended \u200bsuch an outcome.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Koh also \u200bsaid the opponents didn’t show the rule was unconstitutional in \u200cevery respect, because process heaters are not \u200bcovered by the \u200bEnergy Policy and Conservation Act and the U.S. Department of Energy has not issued federal standards.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Circuit Judge Kenneth Lee dissented, saying the case was “strikingly \u200bsimilar” to a 2023 \u200cdecision where the appeals court said federal law preempted a Berkeley, California \u200bordinance banning natural gas infrastructure in new buildings.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel \u200bin New York; Editing by Chizu Nomiayma )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Jonathan Stempel July 2 (Reuters) – A divided federal appeals court on Thursday upheld a ban covering…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":383968,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[36755,155080,155079,17581,48,52,51,47,50,49],"class_list":["post-383967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-9th-u-s-circuit-court-of-appeals","tag-air-quality-management","tag-energy-policy-and-conservation-act","tag-federal-appeals-court","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=383967"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383967\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/383968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=383967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=383967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=383967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}