SACRAMENTO -- California Attorney General Jerry Brown is back on the anti-greenhouse gas (GHG) campaign against automakers - albeit with one of his predecessor's lawsuits.

Brown held a news conference today in front of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals building in San Francisco to tout a state suit against a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) decision in 2006 on gas mileage for so-called "light trucks."

The court began hearing arguments in the case, California v. NHTSA, (docket# 06-72317) this morning. It was originally filed last November by former attorney general and current state treasurer Bill Lockyer, and 12 other state attorneys-general.

The suit opposes the new Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) requirements the NHTSA published April 2006. The regulator ordered all vehicle manufacturers to raise average mileage from 22.2 mpg to 23.5 mpg by 2010.

In a statement released prior to the conference, Brown called last year's NHTSA's mandate on SUV mileage increases "dangerously weak."

"It is unconscionable to have a one-mile-per-gallon mileage boost," Brown's release stated. "We are asking the court to reject this ... mileage plan."

Brown has been on an anti-GHG roll against carmakers since a U.S. Supreme Court ruling early last month. That decision gave states the authority to regulate tailpipe emissions for GHGs, LegalNewsLine reported.

Since then, Brown and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have jointly sued the Federal EPA for not granting California the "waiver" it requires to begin regulating tailpipe GHGs, LegalNewsLine has reported. That waiver has been on hold for 17 months.

Lockyer's original suit claimed the NHTSA did not prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) to justify its CAFE decision. It also disputed NHTSA's opinion that dismissed California's mandate to regulate GHG emissions from vehicles.

"Petitioners' injuries include not only harm to their proprietary interests [through global warming], but also interference with their sovereign interests in being unable to enforce the provisions of their laws designed to curb GHG emissions," it states.

The suit wants NHTSA to conduct an EIS on its recent CAFE decision and to rule that California's GHG regulations not be pre-empted by other agencies.

California also has a public-nuisance suit pending against the "Big Six" automakers for the costs of remedying environemntal and other damage cased by GHGs.