President Obama unveils a comprehensive plan to reduce the pollution that causes climate change, including carbon pollution from power plants.

To address the threat that carbon pollution poses to public health and the economy, EPA proposes a set of common sense rules to cut carbon pollution from existing power plants: the Clean Power Plan.

EPA finalizes the Clean Power Plan – the product of extensive stakeholder outreach, public engagement, and collaboration. It will cut carbon pollution from existing power plants by 32 percent below 2005 levels.

The Clean Power Plan’s formal publication in the Federal Register triggers a flurry of polluter-backed legal attacks that are consolidated into West Virginia v. United States EPA. 

In an unusual move, the Supreme Court grants a request to stay the Clean Power Plan before a lower court had heard arguments on the merits of the case. This decision was not a ruling on the legal merits of the plan.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit hears oral arguments in the polluter-backed lawsuit against the Clean Power Plan, known as West Virginia v. United States EPA.