The Charleston Gazette
www.wvgazette.com

New Underwood smog plan still short of EPA's standards

Thursday September 28, 2000

By Ken Ward Jr.
STAFF WRITER

Gov. Cecil Underwood on Wednesday proposed a new plan to help coal-fired power plants avoid tough emissions cuts demanded by federal regulators.

In a news release, the governor said his plan will be based on the 85 percent reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions required by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

"I am particularly pleased to be able to place West Virginia in the lead in developing innovative regulatory policies that will create a foundation for a comprehensive approach to air quality management," Underwood said.

Details of the Underwood plan were sketchy, and concrete estimates of expected emissions reductions were not released.

But officials from the state Division of Environmental Protection said the governor's plan would not be as tough as the new EPA regulations. One estimated that it would reduce nitrogen oxide emissions from plants by 80 percent.

"I can tell you that," said John Benedict, assistant chief of the DEP Office of Air Quality. "But we think it's more reasonable."

When nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons bake in sunlight, smog is formed. EPA considers smog a major public health threat. It causes a variety of breathing problems, and is especially hard on children, the elderly and people with existing respiratory problems.

Since he took office in 1997, Underwood has led the efforts of coal-state governors to block EPA proposals to reduce smog-causing emissions from coal-fired utilities.

EPA Administrator Carol Browner wants power plants to slash nitrogen oxide emissions by 85 percent.

Underwood and other governors preferred a 65 percent reduction.

EPA rejected the 65 percent cut as too little. Regulators won a legal battle over the percentage reduction, but the courts did push back the deadline for the cuts from 2003 to 2004.

On Wednesday, the governor's press office issued a news release to announce that the state would file another proposal with EPA by the end of October.

The release said that the new proposal "will achieve a level of environmental performance superior to the plan that is sought by federal regulators."

"Although the governor maintains his long-held position that the plan proposed by the U.S. EPA is based neither on air quality nor science, as it should be, he recognizes that opportunities exist to achieve the emission rate that is at the heart of EPA's initiative through a program that encourages innovative technology," the news release said.

Under the EPA plan, power plants would have to limit the nitrogen oxide emissions to 0.15 pounds per million British thermal units, or Btu.

EPA scientists wanted power plants to meet a nitrogen oxide emissions cap. They assumed that energy production by plants would increase by 3 percent by 2007, and calculated that a 0.15-pound per million Btu emission rate would allow the cap to be met.

Under the governor's new proposal, companies would also have to meet the 0.15-pound per million Btu emissions rate, Benedict said.

But the proposal assumes a 20 percent increase in energy generation by 2007, Benedict said.

The governor's office said that the 20 percent figure is "an appropriate rate of growth for electric power generation in West Virginia through 2007."

If the emissions rate limit assumes a greater energy growth rate, it also gives utilities room for smaller overall reductions.

For example, a plant that generated 50 million Btu would be forced to limit its emissions to 3,900 tons per year under the EPA proposal. Under the governor's new proposal, that same plant would have to limit its emissions to 4,500 tons.

"If EPA assumed 3 percent growth and the utilities feel that a 20 percent rate is more realistic, obviously the cap will be greater than EPA's cap," Benedict said. "The emissions will be higher."

David Flannery, a utility industry lawyer, said that the EPA proposal limited West Virginia power plants to emitting about 25,000 tons of nitrogen oxides during the smog season from May 1 through Sept. 30.

Under the governor's proposal, plants in the state could emit about 30,000 tons during the smog season, Flannery said.

Benedict said that the governor's new proposal was basically one that was submitted to the state by utilities. The governor's news release said that, "Gov. Underwood has been advised by the electric power industry that alternative compliance methods capable of achieving reductions of nitrogen oxides and additional other pollutants that are not the subject of EPA's smog program are being developed with promising results."

Flannery said that the governor's proposal "comes as a result of the usual amount of tension that always exists between regulators and the regulated community.

"It's a result of the back and forth between the governor and the utilities."