Policy News - July 28, 2004

Mercury debate heats up

The U.S. EPA is increasingly coming under fire about its proposal to reduce mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants; by the end of June, the agency had received a record 540,000 comments, the most ever submitted about an EPA rulemaking.

EPA’s proposal called for comments on whether it should require electric utilities to reduce mercury emissions 29% by 2008 through the installation of new control technologies or 70% by 2018 under a market-based trading program. EPA officials prefer the latter approach.

Most commenters opposed both plans, saying that the regulatory approach requiring the use of so-called maximum achievable control technologies (MACT) isn’t stringent enough. Likewise, 11 state attorneys general criticized the trading program as “illegal under the Clean Air Act and unsupported by scientific evidence.” The states include California, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin. In particular, the attorneys general assert that EPA’s proposal wouldn’t address hot spots of local and regional mercury deposition around power plants, which would not be required to install pollution controls (Environ. Sci. Technol. 2004, 38, 126A–127A).

This same concern was voiced by scientists, air quality control managers, and environmentalists, as well as by some members of Congress, who asked EPA’s Inspector General to examine how the agency developed the proposal in light of EPA studies that indicate a tough MACT approach is warranted. In comments submitted to EPA in June, the congressional representatives noted that these studies showed “not only that mercury pollution causes severe health threats to unborn children by way of maternal consumption of certain contaminated fish, but also that utilities are the largest domestic source of mercury emissions.”

Electric power industry groups support EPA’s trading program, saying that this approach would create economic incentives for companies to go beyond the 70% reduction by 2018 and would be “much more conducive to the development of appropriate technologies.” The program’s opponents, on the other hand, insist that existing pollution control technologies can eliminate more mercury on a much faster timetable than that proposed by EPA.

One of the most promising technologies involves activated carbon injection (ACI), which has been used for similar applications by medical and municipal waste incinerators for more than a decade. According to the Institute of Clean Air Companies, an air pollution control industry group, a 50–70% reduction is feasible with ACI by 2008–2010.

EPA is reviewing the comments “to determine what additional information and analyses we may need,” says Cynthia Bergman, an agency spokesperson. The emerging ACI technology is exciting, she admits, noting that EPA still needs a guarantee that the technology will work industry-wide with all types of power plant configurations and all types of coal.

EPA is expected to issue a final rule by March 15, 2005. —KRIS CHRISTEN