EPA toughens air standards; Power plants must cut emissions
By Lynn Sweet
Copyright 1998 Chicago Sun-Times
September 25, 1998
Illinois and 21 other states will have to meet tougher clean-air standards to
reduce
smog under a rule announced Thursday by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Illinois coal-burning power plants probably will bear most of the burden in
reducing the emission of 100,965
tons of nitrogen oxide by 2003.
"The amount of reductions is significant," said Bharat Mathur, chief of the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency's
bureau of air.
"It is a 38 percent reduction in the amount of nitrogen oxide emitted in
Illinois."
Overall, 22 states and the District of Columbia will have to reduce nitrogen
oxide emissions
by 28 percent in five years.
The federal plan, crafted to curb the flow of pollutants to the northeast
portion of the United States, allows states flexibility in figuring out how to
reduce emissions.
EPA Administrator Carol Browner said the plan gives states
"tremendous flexibility to
achieve reductions where they see fit."
Mathur said that in Illinois, the most likely place to cut emissions enough to
meet the EPA goal was in coal-burning power plants.
Illinois has 23 coal-fired plants and ComEd operates seven in the Chicago area.
Don Kirchoffner,
director of external communications for ComEd, said
"We knew this was coming." The utilities had been pushing for the new standards not to be imposed until
2006. He estimated that it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to
upgrade the plants. The company plans to sell the plants by next year.
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