By Mary Ellen Ternes
We love our beautiful vistas. And, as a country, we decided a long time ago that maybe there was more “smoke” out of the Great Smoky Mountains, than just natural atmospheric effect. Some of the pollutants scattering our sunlight and creating hazy vistas are naturally occurring, like pollutants from vegetation and microbial activity (biogenic), erosion (geogenic) and lightning strikes. These natural sources contribute some of the types of pollutants regulated under the Clean Air Act when they’re produced by us, including biogenic volatile organic compounds such as isoprene (photo=chemically reactive and ozone-forming), particulate matter and nitrogen oxides.
But a lot of the haze is also man-made pollution from sources like power plants, commercial and industrial activity and vehicles, particularly from burning (oxidizing) fuel for energy. Substances created by burning fuel include oxidized sulfur from sulfur in the fuel itself (sulfur oxides or SOx), oxidized nitrogen, mostly from the 78 percent nitrogen in our ambient air (nitrogen oxides or NOx), small particles of organic matter or soot, and condensable forms of these materials in really small particles referred to as PM2.5, meaning particulate matter with a diameter less than 2.5 micrometers (1,000,000 times smaller than a meter). Regional haze is also made up of soil and ammonia (NH3) from agriculture.
It is the man-made contribution to this haze impairing visibility in our national parks that has become an issue for us in Oklahoma lately. You might have heard of the issue; it’s big news. A portion of Oklahoma’s proposal to comply with EPA’s regulations implementing the U.S. Clean Air Act’s “Visibility Protection” provisions (known as the “Regional Haze Rule”) has not been approved. So, in place of that portion, the EPA has proposed its own federal plan to take its place. Central to the dispute is primarily the timing and manner of compliance for SO2 emissions.
What is the “Regional Haze Rule” anyway? In 1977, the U.S. Congress added Section 169 to the Clean Air Act, declaring as a new national goal “the prevention of any future, and the remedying of any existing, impairment of visibility in mandatory Class I Federal areas which impairment results from man-made air pollution.” In English, this means that U.S. law requires us to prevent future, and fix existing, air pollution that obscures our views of nationally treasured vistas, like those at the Grand Canyon. The EPA initially adopted visibility protection regulations in 1980, addressing discrete emission sources or small groups of emission sources. Then, in 1990, Congress added CAA Section 169B, inspired by the decreasing visibility in the Grand Canyon. In 1996, the Grand Canyon Commission provided the EPA with strategies to address regional haze created by lots of emission sources, prompting the EPA to adopt its “Regional Haze Rule” in 1999.
This rule requires review, modeling and control of sources emitting pollution that may cause or contribute to this hazy effect within a state’s national parks and also in states downwind from another state. The pollutants regulated by the Regional Haze Rule for their light-scattering properties are generally regulated for health purposes pursuant to another section of the Clean Air Act addressing “National Ambient Air Quality Standards,” which sets standards for “criteria air pollutants.” Thus, while these same pollutants are associated with health effects when they are present in the ambient air at levels above the ambient air quality standards, the purpose of the regional haze rule is primarily aesthetic. That is why we hear regional haze regulations referred to as “aesthetic,” even though these pollutants themselves are associated with health issues.
Because the EPA implements the Clean Air Act and its regulations nationally, and the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality implements the Clean Air Act and its regulations in Oklahoma, the EPA has required ODEQ, along with all other affected state agencies with CAA delegation, to propose their own rules protecting visibility in our national wilderness areas. In Oklahoma, we have one such “national wilderness area,” the Wichita Mountains Wildlife refuge near Lawton. So, the ODEQ is required to propose rules addressing regional haze to protect this area, as well as downwind states that might be affected by Oklahoma sources.
To comply with EPA’s regional haze rule, ODEQ proposed a State Implementation Plan (“SIP) revision on February 19, 2010, including, among other authority, provisions allowing several Oklahoma power plants to convert from coal to natural gas, switching fuel to avoid burning the higher sulfur coal and prevent creating SO2 that might cloud up our vistas over the Wichita Mountains. On March 22, 2011, while EPA proposed to accept much of the proposed SIP, EPA proposed to reject this portion of ODEQ’s SIP dealing with the SO2 emissions and has proposed one of its own (Federal Implementation Plan, or “FIP) to address the rejected portions. This EPA proposal would mandate compliance with an SO2 emission limit either be installation of scrubber technology to remove the SO2, or a fuel switch to natural gas within three, but possibly up to five, years of FIP adoption. Given that retrofitting a coal plant to burn natural gas takes a bit of time, why would EPA appear to mandate the installation of scrubber technology rather than allow ODEQ to instead just allow those power plants to switch fuel from coal to natural gas? Among other issues, such as fundamental disagreements regarding cost and removal efficiencies, EPA reads ODEQ’s SIP as allowing this coal to natural gas fuel transition to last through 2026, which EPA says runs afoul of language in the Clean Air Act itself (and EPA’s regulations) requiring that controls need to be installed “as expeditiously as practicable but in no event later than five years” after adoption of the SIP or FIP.
We shall see. The question may well be settled in court. With the potential impact to energy costs, all this does is provide more incentive to get an OG&E energy audit and set up your online account to monitor your smart meter, if you’re lucky enough to have one yet.
Be Informed
Mary Ellen Ternes, Esq. is a former chemical engineer from both the EPA and industry. She is currently a shareholder with McAfee & Taft and co-chair of its Renewable and Sustainable Energy Industry Group, and is serving a three-year term as City of Nichols Hills Environment, Health and Sustainability Commissioner.
This article was published in the June 2011 issue of Slice Magazine. It is reproduced with permission from the publisher. © 2011 Southwestern Publishing.