EPA seeks remand of Desert Rock coal fired power plant permit to consider gasification technology as BACT
Despite granting a permit for the proposed Desert Rock coal fired power plant in New Mexico less than a year ago, the US Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) recently moved its Environmental Appeals Board (“EAB”) to remand the permit to allow the EPA to reevaluate its decision. In particular, the EPA wants to consider requiring the plant, which would be built by Desert Rock Energy Co., to use low-carbon dioxide gasification technology. The technology gasifies coal before it is burned, resulting in lower carbon dioxide emissions than conventional coal burning technology.
The EPA’s move appears to be the latest example of a shift in policy at the agency regarding carbon dioxide emissions. The EPA under the Bush administration did not generally seek to regulate carbon dioxide. Indeed, the EPA refused to consider the plant’s potential carbon dioxide emissions during the original permitting process last year. The EPA under the Obama administration, on the other hand, has been actively seeking to regulate greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide. In the future, the EPA is expected to reverse its former policy on power plants such as the proposed Desert Rock plant and require them to consider carbon dioxide emissions as part of their prevention of significant deterioration (“PSD”) permit applications.
Proponents of the proposed Desert Rock power plant on the Navajo Indian Reservation in northwestern New Mexico claim it will generate $50 million a year in revenue and bring badly needed jobs to a reservation that faces massive unemployment rates. Opponents of the Desert Rock plant, including environmental groups and the state of New Mexico, have argued that the plant, which would be the third coal fired power plant in the region, will damage the region’s air quality and the health of its residents.
The EPA’s request is also the latest in a series of setbacks for proposed coal fired power plants across the country. Earlier this year, under pressure from environmental groups, the Southern Montana Electric Generation & Transportation Cooperative announced that it would not build a coal fired power plant as planned. Instead it now plans to build a natural gas fired plant along with a few wind towers. In Kansas, Sunflower Electric Power Corp. has taken to the courts to fight the state’s denial of its application for an air quality permit for two coal-fired plants in western Kansas.
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