US judge strikes down Biden climate damage cost estimate

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Friday blocked the Biden administration’s attempt to put greater emphasis on the potential damage from greenhouse gas emissions when creating rules for polluting industries.

U.S. District Judge James Cain of the Western District of Louisiana sided with Republican attorneys general who said the administration’s raising the cost estimate of carbon dioxide emissions threatened to drive up energy costs while decreasing state revenues from energy production. The judge issued an injunction that bars the administration from using the higher cost estimate, which puts a dollar value on damages caused by every additional ton of greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere.

President Joe Biden on his first day in office restored the climate cost estimate to about $51 per ton of carbon dioxide emissions after the Trump administration had reduced the figure to about $7 per ton. Trump’s estimate included only damages felt in the U.S. versus the global damages captured under the higher estimate.

The Biden administration’s revival of a higher figure initially set under the Obama administration would be used to make future rules for oil and gas drilling, automobiles, and other industries. Using a higher cost estimate would help justify reductions in planet-warming emissions by making the benefits more likely to outweigh the expenses of complying with new rules.

Known as the social cost of carbon, the rule uses economic models to capture damages caused by rising sea levels, recurring droughts and other consequences of climate change. The $51 estimate was first established in 2016 and was used to justify major rules such as the Clean Power Plan to tighten emissions standards from coal-fired power plants and separate rules imposing tougher vehicle emission standards.

The carbon cost estimate had not yet been used very much under Biden, but is being considered in a pending environmental review of oil and gas lease sales in western states.

Federal officials began developing climate damage cost estimates more than a decade ago after environmentalists successfully sued the government for not taking greenhouse gas emissions into account when setting vehicle mileage standards, said Max Sarinsky, a professor at the New York University School of Law.

Not fully accounting for carbon damages would skew any cost-benefit analysis of a proposed rule in favor of industry, he said, adding that the social cost of carbon had been “instrumental” in allowing agencies to accurately judge how their rules affect the climate.

“Without a proper valuation of climate impact, it would complicate agencies’ good faith efforts to make reasoned conclusions,” he said.

Republican attorneys general led by Louisiana’s Jeff Landry said the Biden administration’s revival of the higher estimate was illegal and exceeded its authority by basing the figure on global considerations. The other states whose officials sued are Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Dakota, Texas, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Landry’s office issued a statement calling Cain’s ruling “a major win for nearly every aspect of Louisiana’s economy and culture.”

“Biden’s executive order was an attempt by the government to take over and tax the people based on winners and losers chosen by the government,” the statement said.

The Justice Department declined to comment.

A federal judge in Missouri last year had sided with the administration in a similar challenge from another group of Republican states. In that case, the judge said the Republicans lacked standing to bring their lawsuit because they had yet to suffer any harm under Biden’s order.

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Brown reported from Billings, Montana, and McGill from New Orleans.