EPA delays the finalization of climate rules for gas fleet
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration said Thursday it would delay the roll out of tough new climate standards for the power sector to temporarily exclude existing natural gas plants, following pushback from power companies and communities surrounding the plants.
The Environmental Protection Agency said it would finalize standards for coal plants and new natural gas plants in the coming months while it works toward a “stronger, more durable” approach on the nation’s existing gas fleet, the country’s largest source of power generation.
“The agency is taking a new, comprehensive approach to cover the entire fleet of natural gas-fired turbines, as well as cover more pollutants, including climate, toxic and criteria air pollution,” EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a statement.
Regan said while this new approach would achieve “greater emissions reductions than the current proposal,” EPA would also consider “flexibilities to support grid operators” and would recognize “ongoing technological innovation offers a wide range of decarbonization options.”
The agency did not set a timeline on when the new standards would be ready for public review, but the delay would likely mean standards for existing gas plants would not be finalized before the presidential election in November.
The delay is a boon to Texas’ oil and gas industry, for which the power sector remains the largest customer, consuming 40% of the natural gas produced in the United States, according to the Department of Energy.
American Petroleum
Institute Senior Vice President Dustin Meyer praised the change to the clean power plan as a “recognition of the critical role natural gas plays in maintaining electric grid reliability.”
The administration released a draft clean power plan last year that would require fossil-fuel fired power plants to install expensive carbon capture equipment or burn clean hydrogen fuel, with the aim of getting the U.S. power grid to net zero emissions by 2035.
That proposal came under criticism from power utilities worried it would threaten the reliability of the U.S. power grid, leading to more regular blackouts.
The Energy Future Initiative, a nonprofit formed by former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, said in a report last year that the proposal “faces major implementation challenges,” considering the tens of thousands of miles of hydrogen and carbon dioxide pipelines that would need to be built and the high costs of the technology, which the group said was likely to prove far more expensive than the EPA estimated.
At the same time, the administration has come under increasing pressure from communities surrounding the nation’s power plants to improve air quality standards within the clean power plan.
“Many of our communities experience the immediate impacts of living near the existing infrastructure of coal plants, gas plants, pipelines, and extraction and refining facilities,” a coalition of environmental justice leaders, including Robert Bullard, a professor at Texas Southern University, wrote in a letter to the White House earlier this month, according to the Washington Post. “As a result, achieving (environmental justice) should be a central focus of any effort to combat pollution from the power sector.”