The United States District Court for the Eastern District of California has permanently enjoined the enforcement of regulations adopted last year by the California Air Resources Board that required vessel owners and operators to limit emissions of Sulfur Oxides, Nitrous Oxides, and Diesel Particulate Matter from vessel diesel auxiliary and diesel electric engines within twenty-four miles of the California Coast.  U.S. District Judge William Shubb entered the injunction on August 30, 2007, in an action filed by the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, an organization that represents the interests of foreign and U.S. commercial ocean carriers who own or operate ships that have been subject to the regulations since January 1, 2007.  The grounds for the decision are that the regulation was adopted in violation of §209(e)(2)(A) of the Clean Air Act because the regulations impose a “standard relating to emissions” for the vessel engines and CARB did not obtain the authorization for these emissions regulations from the federal Environmental Protection Agency as required by the Act.   The Court granted the PMSA’s motion for summary judgment on its first claim for relief based on the Clean Air Act, but found it unnecessary to rule on the Association’s second claim asserting that even if not wholly barred by the Clean Air Act, the regulation was preempted beyond the seaward three-mile state boundary established by the federal Submerged Lands Act.  
 
            The case, Pacific Merchant Shipping Association v. Thomas Cackette, in his official capacity of Executive Officer of the California Air Resources Board, Case No. CIV S-06-2791 WBS KJM, (E.D. Cal., August 30, 2007) was filed by Flynn Delich & Wise, LLP, on behalf of the PMSA on December 8, 2006.  Erich Wise, a partner in the firm’s Long Beach office was lead counsel for the Association.  He was assisted principally by partner Nicholas Politis and associate Aleks Drumalds.

Click here for a copy of the Court’s ruling.