: Bush Changes Plan on Air Pollution Rules - Will Accomplish Same Ends

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>

> Bush Changes Plan on Air Pollution Rules

> Fri Dec 5, 5:46 AM ET

>

> By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Writer

>

> WASHINGTON - Unable to get Congress to endorse its plan to cut air

> pollution, the Bush administration is crafting a string of regulations

that

> would accomplish the same ends.

>

>

> Power plants would have to cut emissions sharply, but also be given

> flexibility and more time to do it.

>

> The Environmental Protection Agency

>

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> -

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> sites) proposed new requirements Thursday calling on power plants in 30

> states to reduce the amount of smog- and soot-forming chemicals they

> release from their smokestacks. It shortly will announce a rule to cut

> mercury emissions as well.

>

> The level of pollution reductions, the timetable and the strategy for

> getting it done mirror closely proposals the administration offered

> Congress nearly two years ago in its so-called Clear Skies initiative. But

> that legislation has stalled with little indication of any movement.

>

> Democrats, joined by some moderate Republicans, essentially have bottled

up

> the Clear Skies bill in a dispute over whether to regulate carbon dioxide,

> a major " greenhouse " gas produced when burning fossil fuels and linked to

> global warming

>

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> sites).

>

> The Bush administration is strongly against regulating carbon emissions.

>

> Administration officials acknowledged that the new air rules the first

> major pronouncement from the EPA's new administrator, former Utah Gov.

Mike

> Leavitt and the Clear Skies legislation are essentially the same.

>

> " The benefits will be very similar, " Leavitt said in an interview

Thursday,

> adding that the new rules also outline " many of the same strategies " as

the

> Clear Skies initiative which, he said, the administration nevertheless

will

> continue to pursue.

>

> The EPA's smog and soot regulation, as outlined Thursday, would require

the

> sulfur dioxide emissions from power plants be cut from the current roughly

> 10 million tons a year to 3.2 million tons by 2015. Also, nitrogen oxide,

a

> precursor to smog, would have to be reduced from a little more than 4

> million tons annually to 1.7 million tons.

>

> Like Clear Skies, the new regulations would provide states and utilities

> with a pollution trading system in which plants unable to meet the

required

> reductions could buy emission allowances from other plants that have

> exceeded the required cuts.

>

> The rules cover hundreds of power plants in 30 states those that

> " significantly contribute " to ozone and soot pollution in primarily the

> eastern half of the country from Florida to as far west as North Dakota.

>

> The regulations, which are designed to reduce long-distance, interstate

> pollution, will help states, especially in the Northeast, meet the more

> stringent federal health-based air quality standards that are being

> implemented.

>

> Northeast states often have blamed pollution from coal-fired power plants

> in the South and Midwest for much of their dirty air. Such long-distance

> pollution would be reduced significantly under the proposal, officials

said.

>

> Leavitt, in an interview with The Associated Press, called the new

> requirements, which are expected to become final in a year, " the largest

> single investment in any clean air program in history " and predicted they

> will produce " the largest reduction in air pollution in more than a

decade. "

>

> The regulations are part of a broader package, he said, that also will

> include for the first time controls on how much mercury, a substance that

> causes neurological problems, may be released from power plants. A

proposal

> that would cut mercury emissions by 70 percent from 48 tons to 15 tons by

> 2018 will be proposed in the coming days, although the essential elements

> of it were leaked earlier this week.

>

> Environmentalists, who have sharply criticized the Clear Skies proposal as

> a " rollback " of current clean air rules, complained Thursday that the new

> EPA regulations likewise fall short of what is needed.

>

> " The reality is that what they are proposing will still allow industry to

> pollute too much for too long, " said Frank O'Donnell, executive director

of

> Clean Air Trust, an advocacy group. " And that will lead to continuing

> unnecessary health problems. "

>

>

>

> Michael Shore, an air policy specialist at the advocacy group

Environmental

> Defense, said while he had no problems with the cap-and-trade approach to

> reduce smog-causing emissions and soot, the " reductions ought to be deeper

> than being proposed. "

>

> Environmentalists and health advocates have sharply criticized using

> pollution trading when trying to cut mercury emissions, arguing such an

> approach could lead to " hot spots " near plants where owners decide to buy

> credits instead of reducing the amount of mercury that is produced from

> burning fossil fuels.

>

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