A message from the Lower Raritan Watershed Partnership Board

Last Thursday, on the final day of its 2021-2022 term, the U.S. Supreme Court released its decision in West Virginia v. EPA. The majority (6-3) opinion limits the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants under the Clean Air Act §111(d), and has dire environmental implications for our air, land, and waters. It is potentially devastating for Lower Raritan communities and landscapes already suffering the impacts of climate change, impacts which include more frequent storms that intensify flooding, increase pollution, enlarge underwater dead zones, and compromise quality of life for both humans and non-human species. The Court’s decision is an outrageous environmental injustice perpetuated on our communities of color and low-income communities, which have historically been forced to live in less-desirable low lying urban areas devoid of greenery, and are most vulnerable to rising temperatures and the extreme weather brought on by climate change. These populations will now be triply vulnerable due to the poisoning effects of poorly regulated greenhouse gas emissions.

While the Court’s ruling is devastating, it does leave room for the EPA to act on its duty to tackle carbon emissions from power plants, and the LRWP urges EPA to quick action on writing a new rule to cut carbon emissions. The Court’s rule of course does not affect our individual power to take action locally, for example by encouraging Governor Murphy to enact a moratorium on fossil fuel projects here in the Garden State, and by voicing opposition to local proposals for pipelines, fracked gas plants and other fossil fuel based power proposals (an especially ill-conceived plan is Competitive Power Ventures’ 630-megawatt power plant proposal for a densely populated Keasbey neighborhood already overburdened with fossil fuel pollutants). And the Court’s decision has no bearing whatsoever on how we build an informed, engaged community of environmental advocates and stewards working to confront a legacy of environmental injustices in our watershed and how we prepare our neighborhoods for a resilient future. We hope you will join the LRWP in this work through water quality monitoring, boat building, restoration, environmental education and more – see our events page for info.