US Plans for Greenhouse Gas Regulations in 2011, Hopes for CCS

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson testifies before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee about her agency's budget this morning, and she’s given the committee plenty to talk about.

In a letter on Monday responding to questions from Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) and seven other coal-state Democrats, Jackson spelled out her plans for the endangerment finding — the EPA determination in December that greenhouse gases pose a danger to public health and welfare. That finding laid the foundation for future greenhouse gas regulation under the Clean Air Act and stirred up fierce opposition from major emitters.

In the letter, Jackson set a timeline for phasing in greenhouse gas regulations starting in 2011 with only the largest emitters, and she suggested that federal officials will be looking for fast development of carbon capture and storage technologies, or CCS.

First, power plants and industries are off the hook for this year. Jackson said she expects the EPA to begin phasing in permit requirements and greenhouse gas regulations in 2011, and only those companies already applying for Clean Air Act permits for other reasons will have to address greenhouse gas emissions in their permits during the first half of 2011. That would be fewer than 400 plants, she said.

Once the EPA does start phasing in greenhouse gas regulations, between 2011 and 2013, Jackson said she expects the threshold for emitters who are subject to the regulations to be “substantially higher” than the 25,000-ton limit she proposed in her soon-to-be-finalized tailoring rule.

“In any event, EPA does not intend to subject the smallest sources to Clean Air Act permitting for greenhouse-gas emissions any sooner than 2016,” Jackson wrote. She didn’t specify a lower limit for “smallest sources,” though she has said repeatedly that small businesses won’t be adversely affected.

The EPA will be using that extra time before regulations begin to determine what the “best available control technology” — required for new pollution sources and major modifications to old facilities — might be, particularly for coal and natural gas power plants. Jackson said the agency was closely watching development of carbon capture and storage from coal-fired power plants and that it would consider the state of that development when it determines the BACT options.

“EPA’s goal will be to identify practical, achievable and cost-effective strategies for minimizing emissions increases from new facilities and major modifications, recognizing the importance of those projects to the economy and job creation,” Jackson wrote.

The industries affected would bear “only modest impacts on production costs,” she said.

The Supreme Court and the Murkowski Challenge

The endangerment finding puts the U.S. government in line with a nearly three-year-old U.S. Supreme Court ruling. In Massachusetts v. EPA, the high court found in early 2007 that EPA had the authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act and ordered the EPA to make a determination based on science: If the agency found greenhouse gases posed a danger to public health and welfare, the EPA would have to begin setting standards to regulate greenhouse gases emissions from motor vehicles. The EPA drafted a finding then, but the Bush White House never acted on it.

Despite the legal basis for the endangerment finding, the EPA is now under attack from fossil fuel industries and their supporters, and it is facing legislative challenges in Congress.