AIR POLLUTION

CHERYL HOGUE

Congress needs to revamp the new source review (NSR) provisions of the Clean Air Act, an advisory panel says in a report issued last week. This legislation, the report to Congress says, should force older, dirty industrial plants to either install modern pollution control equipment or shut down within a decade.

	SMOKE FREE Panel endorses stricter regulations for older facilities, including coal-fired power plants. PICTURE DESK PHOTO/STEVEN HOLT

Also, EPA and the Justice Department should beef up enforcement of NSR, says the advisory panel for the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA), which is analogous to the National Academy of Sciences and provides advice to Congress on governance. NSR requires facilities to include up-to-date pollution controls as part of major modifications or expansions.

The panel determined that the NSR program helps improve air quality by requiring pollution controls on newly built industrial facilities. The report says this part of the program should continue. But many old, dirty plants have avoided modern controls and are adversely affecting public health, the NAPA report continues. This situation, it says, is unfair to companies that have built new plants or upgraded older ones; to states that are downwind of dirty plants and struggling to improve their air quality; and to communities near older, polluting plants.

Companies with facilities that are major sources of air pollution and that have not installed emissions controls since NSR was enacted in 1977 should upgrade their equipment within the next decade or shut down those plants, the NAPA panel says. The federal government should continue vigorous enforcement of NSR, the report continues.

The same day the panel released its report, EPA and Justice announced the largest settlement ever of an NSR case. Dominion Virginia Electric Power Co. agreed to settle charges that it made major modifications to coal-fired plants without installing emissions control equipment. The utility will spend $1.2 billion to reduce future pollution, spend $13.9 million in projects to offset past emissions, and pay a $5.3 million fine.

The NAPA report is at odds with the Administration's legislative plan to supersede NSR for coal-fired power plants with President George W. Bush's proposed Clear Skies Initiative. The initiative would set limits for three pollutants--sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and mercury--and would allow old generating plants to operate without controls until 2018.

Holmstead PHOTO BY CHERYL HOGUE

Jeffrey R. Holmstead, EPA assistant administrator in the Office of Air & Radiation, says NAPA's recommended 10-year deadline for pollution controls could disrupt electricity markets. "We would have to do a great deal more analysis to determine how feasible that would be."

NAPA also criticized an NSR rule finalized on Dec. 31, 2002, saying the regulation will make it easier for older plants to avoid pollution controls. State attorneys general are making similar arguments in a legal challenge to block the rule (C&EN, Jan. 6, page 20).

In addition, NAPA comments on EPA's plan to classify some types of plant modifications as "routine maintenance," thus exempting them from NSR. "Creating wider loopholes will further thwart the intent of Congress for NSR to promote replacing or upgrading old polluting equipment," the report says.

Environmental activists hail the report. "The academy could not have rejected the Bush Administration's proposed air pollution rules in more sweeping terms," says Philip Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust.

The American Chemistry Council, meanwhile, says the panel report "clearly demonstrates the need to reform the overly complex NSR program." The group calls EPA's final and proposed changes to NSR "reasonable."

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