The Environmental Protection Agency signed a rule to curb toxic emissions from coal-fired power plants, the most-expensive order being considered by President Obama’s administration, according to an environmental advocate briefed on the agency’s action. The regulation includes details for how companies such as American Electric Power Co. and Southern Co. can apply for additional time to comply with the standards for emissions of mercury, arsenic and acid gases, said Howard Learner, executive director of the Environmental Law & Policy Center in Chicago.
“We’re pleased,” Learner said today in an interview. “The administration is going forward with a strong mercury rule that will protect health and the environment.”
Learner didn’t say who provided him with the details on the final rule, which haven’t been made public.
“We will make details available when we are ready to make an announcement,” Betsaida Alcantara, a spokeswoman for the EPA, said Saturday in an email. “As we have made clear, any standard will maximize flexibilities, while providing extensive public health protections from dangerous pollutants.”
When the EPA signs the final regulation, that means it has been cleared by the White House Office of Management and Budget, which reviews proposed agency rules. The White House scrapped another, more expensive, EPA proposal to curb smog-causing ozone in September.
The EPA air-toxics rule, which was estimated to cost $11 billion when proposed earlier this year, was initiated after a federal court threw out standards issued by the Bush administration to limit mercury pollution. Under the proposal, plants will need to install controls to curb toxic materials released when coal is burned.
The EPA rule incorporates three separate limits: one for mercury, a second for acid gases and a third for particulate matter, which is used to target emissions of metals such as chromium, selenium and cadmium.
American Electric, based in Columbus, Ohio, said in June that proposed EPA rules would force it to close parts or all of 11 power plants, eliminating 600 jobs. Complying with the rules would cost $8 billion, most of it on cleaning up or shutting plants that lack pollution-control equipment, it said.
The EPA says the rule would save lives and create 9,000 more jobs than would be lost, as power plants invest billions of dollars to install pollution scrubbing systems or build cleaner natural gas plants. It estimates the regulation could prevent 17,000 premature deaths from toxic emissions.
