EPA Proposes Emissions Limits for New Coal & Natural Gas-fired Plants

The USEPA announced today new proposed carbon dioxide limits for new power plants that will set separate standards for coal-fired and natural gas-fired generating units.  The proposed limit for new gas plants is 1,000 pounds per megawatt-hour for new gas units and 1,100 pounds per megawatt-hour for smaller gas plants and new coal plants. New coal plants would be allowed to average their emissions over a seven-year period if they agreed to meet a more stringent standard in a range from 1,000 pounds per megawatt-hour to 1,050 pounds per megawatt-hour. 

This rule is a new proposal, revising an earlier proposal from April 2012, in which the USEPA had intended to set a single standard of 1,000 pounds per megawatt-hour for both coal- and gas-fired plants.  Under the proposal, new power plants would have to install carbon capture and sequestration technologies to comply with the emissions limits outlined for the plants.   Those technologies capture carbon dioxide and bury it underground but requiring use of the technologies has been vigorously opposed by industry user groups, which say they are not feasible yet. 

For more details about this new proposal visit: http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/2013-proposed-carbon-pollution-standard-new-power-plants. Included are fact sheets, technical sheets, and regulatory impact sheets, along with a link to the previously-proposed 2012 rules for comparison.