Announced Closures, Lawsuits Continue in Wake of CSAPR

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) continues causing problems and uncertainties in the Power Industry in the 27 states affected by the rule. Earlier this week, Ameren Corporation (NYSE:AEE) (St. Louis, Missouri) announced that two power plants in Illinois would be closed by the end of the year. Ameren Energy Resources President and CEO Steven Sullivan clearly blamed the closures on CSPAR.

The closures will be for the Meredosia and Hutsonville energy centers, which have a combined generating capacity of more than 500 megawatts (MW). The Meredosia facility includes a 203-MW coal-fired unit and a 166-MW oil-fired unit. The Hutsonville Energy Center has two coal-fired units with a combined generating capacity of 151 MW.

"CSAPR tightens the restrictions on SO2 and NOx emissions to the point that we cannot continue to economically operate these units," said Sullivan in a company press release. "Numerous options to bring these units into compliance were explored, including installing additional environmental controls, but the costs were just too high to be justified."

The closures will affect approximately 90 employees. The Meredosia plant is the intended site of the much-hyped FutureGen 2.0 project, which will use Babcock & Wilcox Oxy-Coal Combustion Technology to capture up to 90-95% of carbon-dioxide emissions, which will then be transported by pipeline to a storage facility. For additional information, see August 10, 2011, article - FutureGen Version 2.0 Receives $1 Billion in DoE Funding.

"Ceasing current operations at Meredosia has no impact on the viability of FutureGen 2.0," said Sullivan. "FutureGen is still several years from needing a generating unit to test clean coal technology."

The fallout from CSAPR continues in other states, as well. This week, Georgia has added itself to the growing number of states suing the EPA over CSAPR. Other states suing the EPA over the emissions rule are Texas, Alabama, Florida, Kansas, Mississippi, South Carolina, Virginia, Nebraska and Oklahoma. "The EPA has overstepped their authority with a heavy-handed federal takeover of the enforcement of environmental regulations," Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens said in a statement. "More significantly, implementation of this rule will be extremely damaging to our already struggling economy."

The EPA is perhaps starting to get the message. On Thursday, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson gave approval to a proposal to ease CSAPR's requirements in 10 of the 27 affected states. The proposals have yet to go into the Federal Registrar, but will be open for public comment for 30 days after publication.

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