Environment and energy: who decides

Environment and energy decisions in the United States are split across several governments at once. Congress and federal agencies such as EPA, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission set national rules on pollution, interstate power and gas, and reactor safety; states run most air pollution plans, set retail electricity rates through utility commissions and adopt their own clean energy standards; and counties and cities control much of the local siting of energy projects. Since 2022, Supreme Court rulings and a 2026 EPA rescission of the federal greenhouse gas endangerment finding have shifted where climate authority sits, and that shift is still being litigated.

In plain words

No single government runs energy and the environment in the United States.

Congress passes the big laws, like the Clean Air Act. Federal agencies turn those laws into rules. Courts decide whether the agencies stayed inside what Congress allowed.

Your state decides a lot too. It usually approves what your electric company can charge you. Many states require utilities to use a certain share of clean power. States also write the plans that keep air pollution under federal limits.

Your county or city often decides where a solar farm, wind turbine, or data center can go, through zoning.

So “the government should fix this” needs a follow-up question: which government?

Defined terms

Environment and energy authority is described on this page with these terms.

• Cooperative federalism. A design in which a federal law sets standards and states carry out much of the work, with federal backup if a state does not. The Clean Air Act uses this design.
• National ambient air quality standards and state implementation plans. Federal limits on the concentration of certain pollutants in outdoor air, and the state plans that implement them.
• Preemption. When federal law displaces state law on a subject.
• Waiver. Under the Clean Air Act, a federal decision allowing a qualifying state to enforce its own new vehicle emission standards despite general preemption.
• Endangerment finding. An EPA determination that a pollutant endangers public health or welfare, which can trigger a duty to regulate under the Clean Air Act. EPA’s 2009 finding on greenhouse gases from motor vehicles was rescinded in 2026.
• Wholesale and retail electricity. Wholesale sales are sales for resale, generally between generators and utilities; retail sales are to end customers.
• Public utility commission (PUC). A state body, sometimes called a public service commission, that regulates utility rates and service.
• Major questions doctrine. A rule of interpretation under which an agency claiming authority of vast economic and political significance must point to clear congressional authorization.
• Environmental impact statement (EIS). The detailed analysis federal agencies prepare under the National Environmental Policy Act for major actions significantly affecting the environment.

Federal authority

Federal authority over environment and energy in the United States rests on Congress’s constitutional powers, chiefly the power “to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes,” together with the power to make laws “necessary and proper” to carry out its powers.⁠¹ The Tenth Amendment reserves powers not delegated to the federal government “to the states respectively, or to the people”.⁠² Most environment and energy law is built on the line between those two provisions.

Air pollution under the Clean Air Act. Each state must adopt and submit a plan to implement, maintain and enforce the national ambient air quality standards; if a state fails to submit a plan or EPA disapproves it, EPA must issue a federal implementation plan.⁠³ For certain pollutants from existing sources, section 111(d) has EPA set up a procedure under which each state submits a plan with standards of performance, and states may “take into consideration, among other factors, the remaining useful life” of a source.⁠⁴ Section 116 preserves the right of states to adopt their own emission standards, except that a state may not adopt less stringent limits where federal standards apply and may not override specific federal preemption provisions, including the one for new motor vehicles.⁠⁵

Vehicles and the California waiver. States generally may not adopt or enforce emission standards for new motor vehicles.⁠⁶ EPA must waive that preemption for a state that adopted standards before March 30, 1966, if the state determines its standards are, in the aggregate, “at least as protective of public health and welfare as applicable Federal standards,” unless EPA finds the determination arbitrary and capricious, finds the state does not need its standards to meet “compelling and extraordinary conditions,” or finds the standards inconsistent with federal requirements.⁠⁶ In June 2025, Congress used a joint resolution of disapproval to declare that EPA’s January 2025 waiver decision for California’s “Advanced Clean Cars II” standards “shall have no force or effect” (Public Law 119-16).⁠¹⁴

Greenhouse gases. In Massachusetts v. EPA (2007), the Supreme Court held 5 to 4 that greenhouse gases fit within the Clean Air Act’s definition of “air pollutant,” and that EPA could decline to regulate new vehicle emissions only if it determined they do not contribute to climate change or gave a reasonable explanation for not making that determination.⁠⁷ EPA then issued its 2009 endangerment finding. On February 12, 2026, EPA finalized a rule rescinding that finding and all greenhouse gas standards for light-, medium- and heavy-duty highway vehicles, stating that the “best reading” of section 202(a) does not authorize those standards and that the action affects only greenhouse gases, not traditional air pollutants.⁠¹⁰ In September 2026, EPA proposed in a supplemental notice that section 111 “does not authorize the EPA to regulate emissions from power plants in response to global climate change concerns,” which would require repealing the 2015 and 2024 power plant greenhouse gas standards.⁠¹¹ That power plant step is a proposal, not a final rule, as of the access date.

Interstate electricity and gas. Under the Federal Power Act, federal regulation of electricity extends to transmission in interstate commerce and wholesale sales, and only to matters “not subject to regulation by the States”; facilities for generation, local distribution and purely intrastate transmission generally fall outside federal jurisdiction “except as specifically provided”.⁠¹⁵ The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission administers that authority. Under the Natural Gas Act, a company needs a certificate of public convenience and necessity from the Commission to build or operate interstate natural gas facilities, and a certificate holder that cannot acquire land by contract may use eminent domain.⁠¹⁶ The Department of Energy also holds emergency authority under section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act, which it has said its July 2025 grid reliability methodology “informs”.⁠²⁶

Nuclear power. Under the Atomic Energy Act, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission may agree with a state’s governor to hand over regulation of certain nuclear materials, but it keeps authority over “the construction and operation of any production or utilization facility,” which includes reactors.⁠¹⁷ The same section preserves state and local power “to regulate activities for purposes other than protection against radiation hazards”,⁠¹⁷ which leaves room for state regulation of nuclear power for purposes other than radiation safety.

Environmental review. The National Environmental Policy Act requires a detailed statement on the environmental effects of, and alternatives to, major federal actions significantly affecting the environment.⁠²¹ Amendments enacted in 2023 set deadlines of 2 years for an EIS and 1 year for an environmental assessment, measured from triggering events, and page limits of 150 pages for an EIS (300 for extraordinary complexity) and 75 for an environmental assessment, excluding citations and appendices.⁠²²

Tax law. Congress also shapes energy markets through the tax code. Federal law enacted July 4, 2025 terminates the clean electricity production and investment credits for wind and solar facilities placed in service after December 31, 2027, unless construction began by July 4, 2026, according to IRS Notice 2025-42.⁠²⁷

Courts

Federal courts decide how far environment and energy statutes reach, and three Supreme Court decisions since 2022 changed how those questions are answered.

West Virginia v. EPA (2022). By 6 to 3, the Court held that Congress did not grant EPA authority under section 111(d) “to devise emissions caps based on the generation shifting approach” of the Clean Power Plan, which would have shifted electricity production from coal toward gas and renewables. The Court called this a major questions case in which the agency “must point to ‘clear congressional authorization’”.⁠⁸ Justice Kagan’s dissent, joined by two justices, said the Court “strips the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the power Congress gave it to respond to ‘the most pressing environmental challenge of our time’”.⁠⁸

Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024). In an opinion joined by six justices (Justice Jackson did not take part in the lead case, No. 22-451), the Court held that courts “must exercise their independent judgment” in deciding whether an agency acted within its statutory authority and “may not defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous,” overruling the Chevron doctrine. It added that prior holdings that specific agency actions were lawful, including “the Clean Air Act holding of Chevron itself,” remain subject to statutory stare decisis.⁠⁹

Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County (2025). In an opinion by Justice Kavanaugh, with Justice Gorsuch not participating and three justices concurring in the judgment, the Court described NEPA as “a purely procedural statute,” held that courts owe agencies “substantial judicial deference” on the scope of an EIS, and held that an agency need not study the environmental effects of separate upstream or downstream projects merely because the project under review “might foreseeably lead to” them.⁠²³

Pending litigation. Petitions challenging the 2026 endangerment rescission are pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, including Massachusetts v. EPA, No. 26-1061, filed March 19, 2026 by a coalition of states, counties and cities.⁠^12,13 Harvard Law School’s Environmental and Energy Law Program, in a tracker updated September 17, 2026, describes the state petition as filed by 24 states and a dozen counties and cities and lists three other petitions filed in February 2026. The tracker reported no merits ruling as of that update.⁠¹²

State authority

State authority over environment and energy is broad, and in many areas it is where the decisions that most directly reach households are made.

Retail electricity rates. The Energy Information Administration explains that “in some states, public service (utility) commissions fully regulate prices,” while other states leave generation prices unregulated and regulate transmission and distribution.⁠¹⁸ Because generation, local distribution and retail sales generally fall outside federal jurisdiction,⁠¹⁵ the body most people can petition about their electric bill is a state commission, not Congress.

Clean energy mandates. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory reported in August 2024 that 29 states plus the District of Columbia have a renewables portfolio standard, that 16 of them have targets of at least 50% of retail sales and 4 have a 100% RPS, and that “an additional 16 states have adopted a broader 100% CES” (clean electricity standard).⁠¹⁹ These standards are set by state law.

Air quality plans and stricter standards. States write the implementation plans that meet federal air standards,⁠³ and the section 111(d) plans for existing sources⁠⁴ and they may set stricter emission standards except where federal law preempts them.⁠⁵

Litigation as policy. State attorneys general shape federal policy through lawsuits on both sides. Massachusetts v. EPA (2007) was brought by Massachusetts and other petitioners challenging EPA’s refusal to regulate vehicle greenhouse gases;⁠⁷ West Virginia v. EPA (2022) was brought by West Virginia, North Dakota, other states and coal companies opposing the Clean Power Plan;⁠⁸ and states again lead a 2026 challenge.⁠¹³

State limits on siting. The Sabin Center counted 23 state-level laws restricting renewable energy development, adopted in 19 states, as of the end of 2025.⁠²⁰

Local authority

Local authority over environment and energy in the United States works mainly through land use. Counties, cities and townships decide through zoning where large facilities may go, how far they must be set back, and what conditions apply.

The scale is substantial. Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center counted at least 888 state laws and local ordinances restricting renewable energy development across 48 states as of December 31, 2025, of which 865 were adopted at the local level, and identified 567 renewable projects across 48 states that faced significant local opposition.⁠²⁰ The report’s authors call the count “at least” and note that about 40% of those projects were canceled, while cautioning that cancellation “may not be solely due to local opposition”.⁠²⁰

Local authority is not only a brake. The same zoning power lets a community welcome a project, negotiate benefits, or set conditions that make it acceptable. Whether local control should yield to state or federal siting authority for projects with regional benefits is one of the open questions below.

International authority

International agreements on environment and energy bind the United States only as far as the United States has joined them and U.S. law gives them effect. The United States notified the United Nations of its withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on January 27, 2025, and under Article 28 of the Agreement the withdrawal took effect for the United States on January 27, 2026.⁠²⁴

Comparative note. The European Union took the opposite structural approach by writing targets into law: the European Climate Law sets a legally binding target of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, a reduction in net emissions of at least 55% by 2030 compared with 1990, and, since an amendment that entered into force in April 2026, a 90% reduction by 2040.⁠²⁵ The U.S. federal measures described on this page rest instead on agency rules under existing statutes, tax provisions and state law.

Evidence

The evidence about who decides environment and energy questions is documentary: the Constitution, statutes, court opinions, agency rules and official notices. It is more settled than the empirical questions on the evidence page, but three points remain live as of October 26, 2026. First, the legal basis for federal greenhouse gas regulation of vehicles depends on how the D.C. Circuit, and possibly the Supreme Court, resolves the challenges to the 2026 rescission.⁠¹² Second, EPA’s proposal to end power plant greenhouse gas regulation under section 111 has not been finalized.⁠¹¹ Third, Loper Bright means courts will interpret these statutes without deferring to the agency’s reading, whichever direction the agency takes.⁠⁹

Competing interpretations

The division of environment and energy authority is itself contested, and the arguments do not map neatly onto support for or opposition to climate policy.

Congress should decide. One view, reflected in West Virginia v. EPA, holds that choices restructuring a fundamental sector of the economy belong to elected legislators, and that agencies should not find vast new powers in old statutes.⁠⁸ Supporters argue this makes policy more durable and accountable.

Congress already decided. The opposing view, expressed in the dissent, holds that Congress wrote the Clean Air Act broadly so that EPA could respond to new problems, and that requiring fresh legislation for each one effectively disables the statute.⁠⁸ Supporters argue that durability is a weak value if the law cannot act.

States as laboratories or a patchwork. State clean energy standards;⁠¹⁹ and California’s vehicle program⁠⁶ let states choose different paths. Supporters call this healthy experimentation and respect for local preference. Critics say a national market for cars and a regional grid make a patchwork costly, and that one state’s rules can shape products sold everywhere.

Local control or regional need. Local siting restrictions⁠²⁰ protect communities from bearing costs they did not choose. Critics argue that projects serving whole regions should not be blocked by each locality in turn. The same argument is made about pipelines and about transmission lines, by different coalitions.

Application to this framework

My Vote Forward’s framework requires every proposal to name the body with authority to adopt it. Environment and energy shows how often that body is not the one people first think of.

Hypothetical example: A participant writes “lower my electric bill and cut pollution.” Under the framework, that would be split into proposals with named authorities: a rate case before the state utility commission⁠¹⁸ a change to a state clean energy standard by the state legislature;⁠¹⁹ a vehicle or power plant emissions standard, which depends on federal statute, EPA rulemaking and the courts;⁠^10,11 and a county zoning change for a local solar project.⁠²⁰ Each has a different decision maker, cost and timeline, and opinions about one should not be reported as support for another. See jurisdictions for why layered districts make this localization unavoidable.

Priorities on this subject should be published with the jurisdiction they were collected in, because the same priority implies different actions in a state with a 100% clean electricity standard and in one without any standard. See priorities and representation.

Unresolved questions

Environment and energy authority in the United States leaves these questions open as of October 2026.

• Will the D.C. Circuit uphold or vacate the 2026 endangerment rescission, and will the Supreme Court be asked to revisit how Massachusetts v. EPA (2007) applies?
• If federal greenhouse gas regulation of vehicles and power plants ends, will states fill the gap, and how far can they go without running into federal preemption?
• Should siting authority for regional energy infrastructure, including transmission lines and pipelines, move from localities to states or the federal government? Who should decide that?
• How will NEPA’s 2023 deadlines and the 2025 Seven County decision change the length and content of environmental reviews in practice? Early data are not yet available in the sources reviewed here.
• Can a participation framework fairly represent people affected by a decision made in a jurisdiction where they cannot vote, such as residents downwind of another state’s plants?