The U.S. states that already have a plan in place to cut carbon pollution from power plants are likely to make the case to regulators this week that their program offers a viable model for others to follow.
The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday kicks off an 11-city "listening tour" as part of its effort to craft emissions rules for existing power plants. The tour starts in New York and Atlanta. Meetings will then be held from Boston to Seattle, wrapping up on Nov. 8. The agency is expected to solicit ideas on how best to regulate carbon emissions from the more than 1,000 power plants now in operation - the cornerstone and arguably the most controversial part of the Obama administration's strategy to address climate change. The EPA will use a rarely employed section of the federal Clean Air Act, known as section 111(d), and will rely heavily on input from states to craft a flexible rule that can be applied to states with different energy profiles. President Barack Obama set a June 2014 deadline for the agency to propose its rules, which need to be finalized in June 2015. Officials from some of the nine northeastern states in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) - a carbon trading program targeting power sector emissions - will attend some of the sessions and make the case that the initiative has a "plug and play" option for states to meet future federal... |
