| For which we can thank President Trump and Senator Mitch McConnell working together to fill empty judgeships across the land... and especially flipping the Ninth Circuit from crazed to mostly sensible. |
The Act expressly preempts State and local regulations on the energy use of natural gas appliances used in household and restaurant kitchens, according to the Ninth Circuit judges’ opinion on Monday."Instead of directly banning those appliances in new buildings, Berkeley took a more circuitous route to the same result and enacted a building code that prohibits natural gas piping into those buildings, rendering the gas appliances useless," according to Judge Patrick Bumatay.
"States and localities can’t skirt the text of broad preemption provisions by doing indirectly what Congress says they can’t do directly. Berkeley can’t evade preemption by merely moving up one step in the energy chain and banning natural gas piping within those buildings."
Judge Miller Baker, concurring, wrote that the Berkeley ordinance "cut to the heart of what Congress sought to prevent," which is state and local manipulation of building codes for the purpose of regulating natural gas consumption.
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