Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23a349_0813.pdf
Page Number: 26

4 

OHIO v. EPA 

BARRETT, J., dissenting 

States.”  Ante, at 6; see ante, at 12.  But try as it might, the 
Court identifies no evidence that the FIP’s emissions limits 
would  have  been  different  for  a  different  set  of  States  or 
that  EPA’s  consideration  of  state-specific inputs was  any-
thing but confirmatory of the limits it calculated based on 
nationwide  data.    See  ante,  at  5–6,  19,  n.  14.    The  Court 
leans on the fact that EPA “considered data specific to the 
emissions-producing facilities  in [each] State” to  calculate 
“how much each upwind State’s [NOx] emissions would fall” 
if  the  State’s  emitters  “adopted  each  [emissions-control] 
measure.”  Ante, at 5 (citing EPA, Ozone Transport Policy 
Analysis  Proposed  Rule  TSD  9–10,  13,  22–23,  (EPA–HQ–
OAR–2021–0668–0133, Feb. 2022) (Proposed Ozone Analy-
sis)).    But  the  Proposed  Ozone  Analysis  makes  clear  that 
EPA did these state-specific calculations to determine each 
State’s “emissions budget.”  Proposed Ozone Analysis 7–13.  
A State’s budget consists of the “emissions that would re-
main”  after  the  State’s  power  plants  meet  the  emissions 
limits  that  EPA  independently  calculated.    88  Fed.  Reg. 
36762; see Proposed Ozone Analysis 13 (“adjust[ed]” “unit-
level emissions are summed up to the state level”); n. 6, in-
fra.  Of course each State’s emissions budget will depend on 
the  emitters  in  that  State.    What  matters  is  whether  the 
limits the FIP imposes on each emitter depend on the num-
ber of States the FIP covers.  Tellingly, the Court does not 
identify any NOx limit for any industry that relied on state-
specific data. 
  On the contrary, as I will explain in Part II–B, the final 
rule  and  its  supporting  documents  suggest  that  EPA’s 
methodology for setting emissions limits did not depend on 
the number of States in the plan, but on nationwide data 
for the relevant industries—and the FIP contains many ex-
amples of emissions limits that EPA created using nation-
wide inputs.  Moreover, EPA has now confirmed this inter-
pretation.    During  this  litigation,  EPA  received  petitions 
seeking  reconsideration  of  the  FIP  on  the  ground  that  it