SACRAMENTO -- Automakers look set for defeat in a long-running battle against tough Californian greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions laws, following yesteday's U.S. Supreme Court EPA ruling.

The ruling allows California and 11 other states to regulate tailpipe emissions of GHGs, mostly carbon dioxide, from cars inside its borders. GHGs are believed to exacerbate global warming.

It also bolsters California Attorney General Jerry Brown's bargaining position in two remaining state lawsuits involoving the "big six" automakers. Carmakers yesterday called for an "economy-wide approach" to GHGs.

Following the result, Brown told a press conference the Supreme Court's decision had "dealt a defeat to General Motors and other auto companies that are attempting to sabotage California's pioneering controls on greenhouse gas emissions."

But later he called on the leaders of the big six (Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Toyota, Nissan and Honda) to meet with him to discuss settling the two oustanding lawsuits betweem them and his office.

The Golden State is now free to enact measures widely expected to break new ground in the U.S. on GHG-based vehicle-emission standards. Foremost will be a long-postponed measure to force auto-makers to cut GHG tailpipe-outputs by almost one third in under 10 years.

The so-called "Pavley law," first passed in 2002, mandates a 20 percent cut in tailpipe GHG emissions by 2012 and a 30 percent reduction by 2016. California has been requesting EPA authority to limit vehicular GHGs since 2005.

The ruling is expected to mean defeat for a lawsuit brought by automakers in federal court in Fresno that has prevented the standards from being implemented, as reported recently in LegalNewsLine. The big six argued that California could not override federal jurisdiction over vehicular-emissions control.

The judge suspended that case in January pending the outcome of yesterday's decision, which essentially said that states could regulate tailpipe GHG emissions via their state EPA.

Observers like Frank D. Russo in yesterday's liberal California Progress Report blog said USSC's ruling even boosts California's public-nuisance suit over vehicular GHGs. That was filed by Brown's predecessor, Bill Lockyer, against the big six in late 2006.

That lawsuit had been called "frivolous" by conservative legal opponents, who called on Brown to drop it. Brown has broadly implied that he would prefer to settle rather than litigate the matter, and repeated that preference yesterday.

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers (AAM) clearly wants to see the regulatory burden on GHG emissions spread more widely. The AAM stated yesterday that theirs is the only industry subject to carbon dioxide regulations over the past 30 years.

President and CEO Dave McCurdy said AAM members "believe there needs to be a national, federal, economy-wide approach to addressing greenhouse gases. This decision says that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be part of this process."

California's Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger hailed yesterday's Supreme Court ruling, saying it would help lead to "a better quality of life for all Californians."