Obama Orders EPA Power Plant GHG Rules As Centerpiece Of Climate Plan

摘要

President Obama's sweeping climate plan unveiled June 25 will make EPA greenhouse gas (GHG) rules for new and existing power plants a centerpiece of his second term climate agenda, with Obama directing EPA to propose first-time rules to limit emissions at existing power plants in June 2014 and to finalize those rules a year later. EPA in September will also re-propose its GHG rule for newly constructed power plants, first issued in April 2012. A final date for that new source performance standard (NSPS) is uncertain, but it would have to be in place before the agency could finalize a NSPS for existing facilities. Utilities had argued that EPA could not finalize the proposal as floated, after the agency missed a one-year Clean Air Act deadline for issuing a final NSPS. It is unclear whether EPA in the re-proposal will grant industry's push to set different GHG standards for coal-and natural gas-fired utilities - the proposal set a GHG limit applicable to both types of plants, and critics said while many gas plants could easily meet it, the rule effectively would have prohibited construction of any new coal-fired utilities because it mandated they install expensive and unproven carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology.