The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers petitioned a federal appeals court to rehear its argument that California’s low carbon fuel standard (LCFS) violates the US Constitution’s interstate commerce clause.
AFPM’s Oct. 2 petition also said the US Appeals Court for the Ninth Circuit’s Sept. 18 opinion conflicted with established US Supreme Court precedent by applying the wrong legal standard to a regulation that discriminates against interstate commerce on its face.
The opinion also ignored California’s numerous admissions that the state designed the LCFS specifically to help biofuels production within its borders grow at the expense of other states’ biofuels industries, the petition contended.
The appeals court, by 2 votes to 1, reversed a lower court’s decision that had declared the California LCFS unconstitutional (OGJ Online, Sept. 19, 2013). AFPM said it built its petition on Appeals Court Judge Mary H. Murguia’s dissent.
“The Court’s ruling sets a dangerous precedent,” AFPM General Counsel Rich Moskowitz said. “If California may penalize fuels based on the location of origin and the type of processes used to create them, it may likewise penalize every other imported product, whether it be oranges from Florida or cars from Michigan.”
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