EPA requires limit on mercury emissions from power plants
The Environmental Protection Agency finalized new federal standards on toxic pollutants and mercury emissions from coal power plants Wednesday, a move being praised by environmentalists but criticized by others, who predict lost jobs and a strain on the nation’s power grid.
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, at an event at the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, announced that for the first time U.S. coal and oil-fired power plant operators must limit their emissions of mercury and other hazardous air pollutants.
“I am glad to be here to mark the finalization of a clean air rule that has been 20 years in the making, and is now ready to start improving our health, protecting our children, and cleaning up our air,” Jackson said. “Under the Clean Air Act these standards will require American power plants to put in place proven and widely available pollution control technologies to cut harmful emissions of mercury, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases. In and of itself, this is a great victory for public health, especially for the health of our children.”
EPA rules in place since the 1990s target acid rain and smog-forming chemicals emitting from power plants, but not mercury, a neurotoxin known to damage developing fetuses and children.
Senate panel examining how chemicals in daily life affect kids’ health
Despite federal limits on emissions of mercury from other sources, such as waste incinerators, there have been no limits on coal-fired power plants, which the EPA says constitute the single largest source of mercury emissions.
“These standards rank among the three or four most significant environmental achievements in the EPA’s history,” said John Walke, clean air director of the National Resources Defense Council. “This rule making represents a generational achievement.”
The new regulations are among the most wide-reaching to come from the EPA during Barack Obama’s administration. They include separate limits for mercury emissions, acid gasses, and other pollutants from several metals.
Opinion: We must stop allowing mercury pollution
Specifically, the EPA will impose numerical emission limits for all existing and future coal plants and propose a range of “widely available, technical and economically reasonable practices, technologies, and compliance strategies,” to meet the new demands.
According to an EPA analysis, the larger economic benefits of the reduced pollution will more than pay for the short-term clean-up costs. The EPA also predicts more jobs will be created than lost as power plants invest million of dollars in upgrades.
It also estimates the new regulations, by reducing people’s exposure to these toxins, will prevent 11,000 premature deaths each year and trim health costs.
The Environmental Protection Agency finalized new federal standards on toxic pollutants and mercury emissions from coal power plants Wednesday, a move being praised by environmentalists but criticized by others, who predict lost jobs and a strain on the nation’s power grid.
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, at an event at the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, announced that for the first time U.S. coal and oil-fired power plant operators must limit their emissions of mercury and other hazardous air pollutants.
“I am glad to be here to mark the finalization of a clean air rule that has been 20 years in the making, and is now ready to start improving our health, protecting our children, and cleaning up our air,” Jackson said. “Under the Clean Air Act these standards will require American power plants to put in place proven and widely available pollution control technologies to cut harmful emissions of mercury, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases. In and of itself, this is a great victory for public health, especially for the health of our children.”
EPA rules in place since the 1990s target acid rain and smog-forming chemicals emitting from power plants, but not mercury, a neurotoxin known to damage developing fetuses and children.
Senate panel examining how chemicals in daily life affect kids’ health
Despite federal limits on emissions of mercury from other sources, such as waste incinerators, there have been no limits on coal-fired power plants, which the EPA says constitute the single largest source of mercury emissions.
“These standards rank among the three or four most significant environmental achievements in the EPA’s history,” said John Walke, clean air director of the National Resources Defense Council. “This rule making represents a generational achievement.”
The new regulations are among the most wide-reaching to come from the EPA during Barack Obama’s administration. They include separate limits for mercury emissions, acid gasses, and other pollutants from several metals.
Opinion: We must stop allowing mercury pollution
Specifically, the EPA will impose numerical emission limits for all existing and future coal plants and propose a range of “widely available, technical and economically reasonable practices, technologies, and compliance strategies,” to meet the new demands.
According to an EPA analysis, the larger economic benefits of the reduced pollution will more than pay for the short-term clean-up costs. The EPA also predicts more jobs will be created than lost as power plants invest million of dollars in upgrades.
It also estimates the new regulations, by reducing people’s exposure to these toxins, will prevent 11,000 premature deaths each year and trim health costs.
