The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a draft rule proposing to determine that it is not “appropriate and necessary” to regulate hazardous air pollutant emissions from coal- and oil-fired power plants, rescinding a 2016 supplemental cost finding that formed the basis for the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, according to a Dec. 28 press release. The agency said that the projected annual compliance costs for MATS, which the Obama administration determined to range from $7.4 billion to $9.6 billion, “dwarfs the monetized benefits” estimated at $4 million to $6 million. The proposal does not repeal the requirements of the MATS rule, which have been in place since 2012 and with which, electric utilities have been complying for years.
In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the agency erroneously determined that costs did not have to be considered when making the “appropriate and necessary” finding. In response, the agency issued the supplemental finding concluding that the cost consideration did not alter its previous finding. In its latest action, EPA found that the co-benefits – which come from reducing pollutants other than those targeted – identified by the prior administration are insufficient to support the finding “in light of the gross imbalance of monetized costs and hazardous air pollutant benefits.” When the rule was issued in 2012, the agency emphasized that ancillary benefits, including reducing emissions of particulate matter and sulfur dioxide, which are not covered by MATS, would result in quantifiable benefits of $37 billion to $90 billion per year.
The proposal also includes a legally required eight-year “residual risk and technology review,” which found that no changes to the 2012 standards are warranted. Electric utility groups including the American Public Power Association, Edison Electric Institute, and National Association of Rural Electric Cooperatives, wrote to the EPA in June urging the agency to speed the reviews and leave the underlying MATS rule in place. The groups said that industry spent over $18 billion to comply with the rule, reducing mercury emissions by nearly 90 percent over the past decade.
Coal plant retirements were highest in 2015, due in part to stricter emissions standards required by the MATS rule, which took effect in April of that year, according to a Dec. 4 report from the Energy Information Administration.
Comments on the proposal are due within 60 days after publication in the federal register.
