In 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) fundamentally restructured the United States economy by adopting its Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding. The rule empowered the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases to protect public health. It also triggered a cascade of burdensome regulations and new layers of red tape, imposing more than a trillion dollars in estimated compliance costs, which are disproportionately borne by small energy producers like members of the Domestic Energy Producers Alliance (DEPA).
The EPA repealed the endangerment finding on February 12, 2026, and almost immediately faced a lawsuit asking the court to reverse that decision and reinstate the endangerment finding. But when government agencies correctly relinquish powers that they should never have exercised, the courts should not order them to take those powers back up.
Represented by Pacific Legal Foundation and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group of energy producers across the country filed a motion to intervene in the lawsuit to support the EPA’s repeal. The Domestic Energy Producers Alliance represents 39 coalition associations of American oil and natural gas producers, themselves representing more than 10,000 individuals and organizations across the country.
They argue that the EPA exceeded its statutory authority and wrongly exercised legislative power by adopting the 2009 endangerment finding and urge the Court to affirm the agency’s repeal.
What’s At Stake?
- Restoring constitutional limits on agency power is essential to an abundance‑oriented energy policy—one that encourages innovation, affordability, and reliable domestic energy production for all Americans.
- Government agencies have the power and the responsibility to undo actions that they lacked legal authority to take in the first place. Courts cannot order an agency to permanently exercise powers Congress never granted.
- The Clean Air Act was never intended to hand EPA unilateral control over the American energy economy. Decisions of this magnitude require clear authorization from Congress, not a blank check to unelected officials.
- People deserve a voice in decisions of national importance. When unelected bureaucrats claim the authority to restructure the nation’s energy policy without congressional approval, they silence the Americans whose lives and livelihoods depend on those decisions.
