Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/08pdf/07-588.pdf/07-588.pdf
Page Number: 37.0

8 

ENTERGY CORP. v. RIVERKEEPER, INC. 

STEVENS, J., dissenting 

analysis  in  BPT  gave  the  EPA  the  ability  to  cushion  the 
new  technology  requirement.  For  a  limited  time,  a  tech-
nology  with  costs  that  exceeded  its  benefits  would  not  be 
considered “best.” 

of 

all 

the 

discharge 

The  second  tier  of  technology  standards  required  exist-
ing  powerplants  to  adopt  the  “best  available  technology 
economically  achievable”  to  advance  “the  national  goal  of 
eliminating 
pollutants.”
§1311(b)(2)(A).  In setting this “best available technology,” 
or  “BAT,”8  standard,  Congress  gave  the  EPA  a  notably 
different  command  for  deciding  what  technology  would 
qualify  as  “best”:  The  EPA  was  to  consider,  among  other 
factors, “the cost of achieving such effluent reduction,” but 
Congress  did  not  grant  it  authority  to  balance  costs  with
the benefits of stricter regulation.  §1314(b)(2)(B).  Indeed, 
in Crushed Stone this Court explained that the difference 
between  BPT  and  BAT  was  the  existence  of  cost-benefit 
authority in the first and the absence of that authority in
the  second.  See  449  U. S.,  at  71  (“Similar  directions  are 
given  the  Administrator  for  determining  effluent  reduc-
tions  attainable  from  the  BAT  except  that  in  assessing 
BAT total cost is no longer to be considered in comparison
to effluent reduction benefits”).

The BAT standard’s legislative history strongly supports
the view that Congress purposefully withheld cost-benefit
authority for this tier of regulation.  See ibid., n. 10.  The 
House  of  Representatives  and  the  Senate  split  over  the
role cost-benefit analysis would play in the BAT provision.
The House favored the tool, see H. R. Rep. No. 92–911, p.
107  (1972),  1  Leg.  Hist.  794,  while  the  Senate  rejected  it, 

—————— 

category  of  sources.”    1  Legislative  History  of  the  Water  Pollution 
Control  Act  Amendments  of  1972  (Committee  Print  compiled  for  the 
Senate  Committee  on  Public  Works  by  the  Library  of  Congress),  Ser.
No. 93–1, p. 170 (1973) (hereinafter Leg. Hist.) 

8 Although  the  majority  calls  this  “BATEA,”  the  parties  refer  to  the

provision as “BAT,” and for simplicity, so will I.