RENEE MONTAGNE, Host: As NPR's Chris Arnold reports, the court's decision also affirmed the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency.</s>CHRIS ARNOLD: The case is being called the Supreme Court's most important environmental ruling in years. The state governments were suing power companies to get them to cut greenhouse gas emissions. But the Supreme Court said no. It said that such regulation should be left to the EPA.</s>RENEE MONTAGNE, Host: Well, it's a big deal because of the reaffirmation of EPA authority.</s>CHRIS ARNOLD: Kenneth Green is with the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute. On the one hand, he's happy that the court said that you can't have all these different emissions lawsuits. He says that would have created a big, confusing mess. But he's nervous about the power that the EPA could have going forward, as a sort of supreme regulator of greenhouse gases.</s>RENEE MONTAGNE, Host: It really leaves one battlefield left over greenhouse gas emission control and that is will the Congress step in to strip EPA of its ability to regulate the greenhouse gases or won't they?</s>CHRIS ARNOLD: Daniel J. Weiss is a fellow with the more liberal-leaning Center for American Progress.</s>RENEE MONTAGNE, Host: The Supreme Court decision will continue EPA's momentum to set safeguards from global warming pollution from the very largest polluters.</s>CHRIS ARNOLD: Chris Arnold, NPR News.
The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a global warming lawsuit brought by Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Iowa and California against five major power companies. The case is being called the court's most important environmental ruling in years.