States hold informal sessions on EPA GHG standards

Washington, 6 August (Argus) — State and local officials are holding their own public meetings to discuss proposed CO2 standards for existing power plants following last week's formal hearings held by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Among the events scheduled to take place over the next few days and weeks, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) will hold the last of four listening sessions tomorrow in Henrico, Virginia, and EPA region 1 administrator Curt Spalding attended a "citizen's hearing" today at the University of Southern Maine in Portland, Maine.

EPA Region 8 administrator Shaun McGrath will attend a two-day event on the proposed rules next month in Colorado. Moffat County, in the northwest corner of the state, will host a discussion on the proposal on 10 September, followed the next day by tours of a local coal mine and Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association's 1,339MW coal-fired Craig station, county commissioner John Kinkaid said.

The informal listening sessions are helping states gather feedback ahead of two key dates: the end of EPA's formal comment period on 16 October and the 30 June 2016 deadline for initial compliance plans. The schedule is challenging because preparing the plans requires the "integrated efforts" of numerous state agencies and potentially other states, the Virginia DEQ said.

"These rules may have a significant impact on the commonwealth and implementing them may be a challenge," DEQ air division director Michael Dowd, said at a 28 July listening session in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

The four "building blocks" that EPA used to set the standards are "over exaggerated in terms of what can be accomplished in certain areas," Laura Rose, an environmental health and safety coordinator at Old Dominion Electric Cooperative, said at the same listening session. The average 6pc efficiency improvement for coal-fired power plants is "infeasible" and the 1.5pc energy efficiency improvement each year is "overly aggressive," she said. The cooperative owns or operates coal, gas, nuclear, and oil generation serving 11 areas in Delaware, Virginia and Maryland.

EPA's proposal would set CO2 emissions rate targets for each state's generation fleet to meet by 2030. The agency estimates the proposal will result in a 30pc reduction in power sector emissions by 2030 from 2005 levels.

EPA's four proposed building blocks categorize the various measures it says make up the "best system of emissions reduction" for setting the standards. The blocks include increasing the efficiency of coal-fired power plants, increasing the utilization of natural gas-fired units while preserving nuclear generation, using more renewables and less carbon-intensive fuels, and reducing end-use power consumption. EPA says states can use these measures to comply meet the targets and take other steps such as emissions trading.