Air will soon be cleaner
EPA sets new caps on plants' foul emissions

By Dan Shapley Poughkeepsie Journal March 11, 2005

People in the Hudson Valley will breathe easier on hot summer days, some may even live longer and some mountain lakes and streams in the Catskills and Adirondacks will be restored to life under a new air pollution rule enacted Thursday by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Clean Air Interstate Rule sets new caps on emissions of sulfur and nitrogen oxides at power plants in 28 Eastern states and the District of Columbia -- reducing emissions from the Midwestern plants that foul New York's air.
Overall, emissions will drop by 60 percent to 70 percent below 2003 levels. The first cuts are required by the end of the decade, and final cuts by 2015.
The new rule is the largest cut in air pollution required since the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, during the administration of President Bush's father.
Critics said the cuts could come faster and go deeper, at a fraction of the health-care expense that would be saved with cleaner air. They also said the rule allows the final reductions to be delayed until 2020.
The pollutants are linked to acid rain, soot, ozone and smog. Acid rain makes mountain lakes and streams inhospitable to life, kills trees and deteriorates buildings. Ozone, soot and smog worsen lung illnesses such as asthma and can cause heart attacks.
'Legacy of better health'
''It will give this generation and generations to come a lasting legacy of better health,'' said Kathleen Callahan, EPA's acting administrator in Region 2, which includes New York.
The EPA estimates, across the Eastern states, the new rule will save as much as $100 billion in annual health-care costs by preventing 17,000 premature deaths, millions of lost work and school days and tens of thousands of heart attacks and hospital admissions.
More than 500 lakes in the Adirondack Mountains will be able to recover from acid rain damage, according to the Adirondack Council, an environmental group that has lobbied to reduce acid rain for decades.
Power companies will have to invest $17 billion on smokestack scrubbers that either capture soot in fabric screens like a vacuum bag or chemically neutralize acids before they escape into the air.
The EPA estimated average retail electricity prices in New York would go up 1 percent because of the new rule.
Dynegy's two power plants on the Hudson River in Newburgh have been among the region's top air polluters. The Houston-based company spent $13 million to reduce nitrogen oxides pollution from the coal-fired Danskammer plant in 2003.
''We're continuing our review of compliance options around the Danskammer and Roseton plants, which may include the installation of additional controls,'' spokesman David Byford said.
EPA: 'Stay under that cap'
Under a strengthening of the same ''cap-and-trade'' system enacted in 1990 that worked to reduce acid rain, the EPA has set a new cap on the emissions allowed from each state. Cleaner plants will be able to sell pollution credits to dirtier plants.
''They need to stay under that cap even in the future when more electricity is used and more fuel is burned to produce that electricity,'' said Raymond Werner, chief of the EPA's air programs in Region 2. ''They're allowed to trade ... but they always need to be under that cap.''
The same smokestack scrubbers will substantially decrease toxic mercury pollution, Werner said. The EPA is set to enact a controversial rule next week that will set limits on mercury pollution for the first time, with a similar cap-and-trade system.
Thursday's rule came a day after President Bush's ''Clear Skies'' legislation died in a Senate committee. That controversial law would have enacted similar pollution reductions but, critics charged, it would have removed the states' ability to sue out-of-state plants that upgrade without installing new smokestack scrubbers.
It's unclear whether the rule will require any New York plants to install new scrubbers.
The EPA claimed the rule will result in New York plants reducing sulfur emissions by 69 percent and nitrogen by 23 percent.
But six of the state's dirtiest plants agreed to steep emissions reductions in January that could bring the state's total emissions below the EPA's new cap. The emissions reductions came as a result of a settlement with New York, which had alleged the plants upgraded without installing modern smokestack scrubbers, as required by the Clean Air Act.
Neither the EPA nor the Department of Environmental Conservation could say Thursday whether those cuts had been factored into the EPA's new cap.
Even if New York plants escape regulation, the rule will go a long way toward reducing emissions from out-of-state plants that drift over New York, EPA officials said.
''It is good, but not nearly as good as it should be and it could be,'' said Peter Lehner, chief of Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's environmental bureau.
The rule enacted Thursday will help Dutchess and some lower Hudson Valley counties meet the national health standard for ozone pollution, and will help lower Hudson Valley counties meet standards for soot pollution, the EPA said.
Hudson Valley residents are typically warned several times each summer that high ozone levels could trigger asthma attacks and other lung problems.
''It's great news for patients with asthma or any chronic lung disease,'' said Dr. Pradeep Sharma, a Poughkeepsie lung specialist. ''Any reduction should help.''
NYC area levels unhealthy
The new rule won't solve all local air pollution problems. In the New York City metro area, vehicles produce about half of the nitrogen oxide pollution linked to acid rain, ozone and smog, Werner said. Summer ozone in New York City, Long Island and Westchester and Rockland counties is expected to reach unhealthy levels even after the rule is in full effect.
The rule will help mountain landscapes recover from decades of acid rain, said Gene Likens, the director of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook. With studies in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, Likens and his colleagues were the first to identify that acid rain from industrial emissions was killing fish and harming forests.
While acidic water in lakes and streams may flush out soon after emissions are reduced, forest soils have lost much of their neutralizing ability, so acid effects will continue for many years, he said.
''The systems are now more sensitive than they were,'' Likens said. ''Cutting off the root cause, which is acid rain, is an important action to take.''

ON THE WEB To read about the EPA's new rule, visit www.epa.gov/cair

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