Obama May Win by Losing in Quirk of Supreme Court EPA Review

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Here’s a twist for the Obama administration as it awaits a U.S. Supreme Court decision on the biggest environmental rule of its first term: A loss shores up the legal basis of the biggest environmental rule of the second term.

The high court is set to decide as soon as Thursday on the 2012 rule by the Environmental Protection Agency that ordered curbs in mercury and other toxic pollutants emitted from coal-fired power plants. As a result of the rule, dozens of old coal plants were shuttered, and utilities have invested billions of dollars to install expensive scrubbers.