State air chiefs, EPA leaders meet on emissions proposal 

Source: Rod Kuckro and Emily Holden, E&E reporters • Posted: Tuesday, April 28, 2015

U.S. EPA’s Clean Power Plan will be front and center as state air pollution agency chiefs gather in Providence, R.I., until Wednesday for their spring meeting.

EPA air chief Janet McCabe and a contingency of deputies and regional administrators will be on hand to discuss the nuts and bolts of potential compliance strategies for cutting power plant carbon emissions 30 percent by 2030 under the agency’s proposed rule.

Equally important on the draft agenda, members of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies will be having “serious discussions” about the group’s forthcoming model state implementation plan, or SIP, said Bill Becker, NACAA’s executive director.

In mid-May, NACAA will release “our menu of options, which will be a 600-page, 26-chapter encyclopedia of every technology, program and policy that an agency could conceivably include in its state plan,” he said. The menu is “agnostic” with regard to the CO2 emissions rate targets in the proposed EPA rule, he said.

Also this week, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz will testify at a Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing Tuesday about the Quadrennial Energy Review, a road map of the Obama administration’s policy suggestions, including on infrastructure development that may be needed under the Clean Power Plan.

On Wednesday, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy will speak about the agency’s proposed budget at a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing.

Go to E&E’s Power Plan Hub to read more about the meeting of state air regulators and to see news and documents related to the latest Clean Power Plan developments.