EPA acts to stop cross-country power plant smog

Reuters News Service
USA: December 20, 1999
                                                 
WASHINGTON - In an unprecedented ruling, U.S. regulators ordered industrial plants and electric utilities in 12 states and the District of Columbia to cut smog-causing emissions that are blown into four northeastern states.
                                                    
The Environmental Protection Agency said some 392 plants and facilities must cut their nitrogen oxide (NOX) emissions. To help the plants make the reductions, the EPA also said it would establish an emissions trading programme.         
                                                
EPA Administrator Carol Browner said the targeted plants must cut NOX by more than 500,000 tons per year, cleaning the air for 18 states from Maine to North Carolina, and Connecticut to Indiana.                
                                                         
The agency took the action after four northeastern states - Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and New York - said they could not meet EPA's smog standard because of dirty air blowing from other states.                                
                                                      
"Today's action means healthier air for communities located near these polluting plants," Browner said. "But it will also provide public health protection for communities hundreds of miles away where air pollution is carried by the wind across states borders."                       

The 392 facilities - some of which were named in a separate lawsuit filed by the government in November for breaking other clean air laws - must achieve emissions cuts by May 1, 2003. EPA said it decided to take the action after a broader 22-state transport pollution rule became entangled in the courts earlier this year.
                                                       
Electric utilities and industrial plants affected by the new emissions cuts are in Delaware, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West
Virginia and the District of Columbia

Climate Ark users agree to the Full Disclaimer as a condition for use. Viewing and/or downloading of this information on these terms only.

See the Climate Ark -- Climate Change Portal at http://www.climateark.org/
Networked by Ecological Internet, Inc., info@ecologicalinternet.org