Commission Watch

The AGs' Global Warming Suits:

A recent lawsuit filed by eight state attorneys general will take the industry to the place where bad policy meets with bad economics.

We all want cleaner air and less pollution. Growing up in an era of acid rain, smog alerts, and, more recently, the threat of global warming and environmental apocalypse, the urge to "do something" today is natural. And because regulations to address air pollution under the Clean Air Act have evolved through a slow, complex, and convoluted process for more than 50 years, that urge has naturally turned to litigation. But regulation by litigation is a terribly expensive and ineffective policy tool. For electric utilities, which remain at the center of many environmental policy battles, litigation is a "lose-lose" proposition that can mean higher costs and less financial security far into the future.