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AIR CONTROL: THE NEXT FIVE YEARS Jay Says |
AIR CONTROL: THE NEXT FIVE YEARS |
by Roy Bigham June 1, 2011
An overview of the current state of U.S. air pollution control policy, the dates, deadlines, and outlook for 2011 through 2015.
Earlier this year EPA air chief Gina McCarthy told a gathering of power industry professionals that she is quite aware agency dithering on air regulations has retarded meaningful investment, and vowed to stick to current deadlines. The candor is appreciated, but the regulated community can be forgiven for feeling a bit skeptical when the agency is pursuing wholly new emission controls while a decade or more behind on some old ones.
Air issues have been top priorities for people around the globe for a long time. The damage wrought from poor air quality is well documented. It often seems that solutions are just out of our reach. Results from study after study in every country on the planet have demonstrated that poor air quality directly causes respiratory ailments, heart ailments, neurological damage, productivity loss, and increased health and hospital expenditures. At the extreme end of the spectrum, it can lead to death as was demonstrated in the Bhopal disaster in 1984. Few places are not touched in some way by air pollutants.
Environmental damage can be aggravated by poor air quality. Emissions can lead to acid rain, eutrophication, smog formation, damage to buildings, crop damage, forest damage and many would argue climate alteration.
Air pollution controls are nothing new. This month the industry will get together in Orlando for the Air & Waste Management Association's 104th meeting. Even before that first meeting in 1907, Progressives had spent nearly two decades lobbying for controls on "smoke." Were one of those early municipal smoke inspectors to come to this year's meeting he might be forgiven for thinking he had stepped into a fantasyland, and not just because the show is at Disney World.
The serious legwork began in the 1960s. People around the world were highly concerned over the obvious damage resulting from air and water pollution. Death rates and illnesses were increasing. Buildings and statues were suffering deterioration much quicker than should be expected. Fish populations were drastically impacted. Water was noticeably dirtier. The United States under then President Nixon formed a new federal agency called the Environmental Protection Agency in 1969 to turn the tide.
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Status of the 'Crit-Six'
Gaining control over what appeared to be a runaway issue of pollution control seemed overwhelming. The first EPA administrator, organizational guru William D. Ruckelshaus, methodically set about the task as required by the 1970 Clean Air Act. That legislation required the EPA to establish national ambient air quality standards through original research.
In 1990, Congress realized that the regulations needed to be tightened in order to achieve improved control over air quality. The 1990 Clean Air Act required the EPA to address additional problems such as acid rain. As a result of the agency's efforts, the list of six "criteria" pollutants were compiled: ground-level ozone, particulate matter, lead, NO2, CO and SO2. Since 1970, the EPA reports that through 2008 the level of the six common emissions has dropped by about 60 percent, despite population and energy use increases of about 48 percent, and a GDP increase of 209 percent (see Figure 1) over that same time. This is a direct result of regulations put in place by the agency in cooperation with the states.
Every engineer involved with air permitting or reporting is (or should be) familiar with EPA's AP-42, Compilation of Air Pollutant Emission Factors. An emissions factor is a representative value that attempts to relate the quantity of a pollutant released to the atmosphere with an activity associated with the release of that pollutant. These factors are usually expressed as the weight of pollutant divided by a unit weight, volume, distance, or duration of the activity emitting the pollutant (e.g., kilograms of particulate emitted per megagram of coal burned). Such factors facilitate estimation of emissions from various sources of air pollution. In most cases, these factors are simply averages of all available data of acceptable quality, and are generally assumed to be representative of long-term averages for all facilities in the source category (i.e., a population average).
The agency will continue to develop additional emission factors for other industries and tweak existing ones over time. It is very important for an air pollution control engineer to make certain the latest updates are included in his or her copy of AP-42.
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2005 Standings: Judges 2, Regulations 0
In the past decade, the EPA did pass new regulations to control air pollutants. Most notable were those controlling fine particulates and ozone pollution that can cross state lines – the Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR) – and controlling mercury – the Clean Air Mercury Rule (CAMR). However in 2005 the courts found that each of these rules were legally flawed. The agency was ordered to replace the CAIR rule – leaving the old one in place until the "Heir to CAIR" could be approved, but CAMR rule was vacated, meaning the future of the agency's mercury regulations were once again mercurial.
The new Transport Rule is due to be announced this month, June 2011.
As for mercury, a consent decree required the agency to propose an air toxic rule to control releases from coal- and oil-fired electric utility steam generating units by March 2011, to be finalized by November 2011. The agency met its obligation by proposing a national standard for mercury pollution from power plants and air toxics standards on March 16, 2011. The new rule would control mercury in addition to the following hazardous air pollutants (HAPs): HCl, HF, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases. The regulation would establish numerical emission limits, but include alternative standards, e.g., tighter controls of SO2 instead of HCL, and other more dangerous air toxics instead of mercury. This means the standard will effectively change regulations for PM, SO2 and NOX, or at least reward companies who currently control their emissions to a higher standard. The new challenge
In 1997 representatives from around the globe met in Kyoto, Japan, to discuss air issues. Out of that meeting came the Kyoto Protocols, better known for calling to reduce CO2 emissions to set levels below 1990 emissions, but including many more air issues. As countries signed on and agreed to meet the stipulations of the protocols, it was most notable that China, India and the United States refused to ratify it. None of them denied the importance of pollution control but the major emitting nations could not agree as to the details.
In 2007, the Supreme Court determined that the EPA did have authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate any air pollutant that might pose a danger to human health or the environment and that could include the so-called greenhouse gas (GHG) list. The agency did conduct further studies and with recommendations from their research groups declared that there was cause for concern over GHG emissions and have moved to required business to track and report such emissions as CO2 equivalents. New Source Performance Standards are expected to be released in 2012.
Focus on power industry
Emissions from power companies burning fossil fuel are the largest single emitter of NOX, SO2 and GHGs, and it's not even close (see Figure 2). That industry is also the single largest source of Hg emissions as shown in Figure 3.
The New Source Review (NSR) provisions of the Clean Air Act were meant to grandfather older plants until they had enough money to make the necessary upgrades; for the power industry the result was a lot of older plants that have avoided making major upgrades for decades. There are 991 power plants capable of producing a total of more than 300 gigawatts of power by burning coal. Of these, 821 or 83 percent are more than 30 years old. Most of the older plants are grandfathered from requirements to add controls such as SO2 exhaust air scrubbers. Thanks to NSR and generations of managers anxious not to trip it, there are in the U.S. today 425 plants that are over 30 years old that do not have adequate air pollution control gear in place. While the U.S. has an abundance of coal reserves, only seven coal-fired plants have been built in the past 10 years. Many plans were put on hold or cancelled due to the idea that the plants might not be able to afford to control some emissions, and it was unclear just what some of those required controls might be at the time.
On the other hand, the power industry has seen an increase in the number of controls added to their systems. Although the world economic slowdown did cause a pullback in investment, there has been a trend since 2006 to add controls such as Selective Catalytic Reduction and Flue Gas Desulfurization systems to power supply plants. See Figure 4. Additionally, the power industry has sought out new energy sources to enable them to meet an ever-increasing demand. In the past decade, there was a resurgence of natural gas power plants but since 2006, renewable sources such as biomass, wind and solar have seen a significant increase in numbers. Many states require companies to produce specific percentages of power from renewable sources by a certain date. California recently increased their requirement to 33 percent by 2020. The previous goal had been 20 percent by 2020. The current requirement is the highest in the nation at this point. Additional research is under way to develop cleaner means of using coal as a fuel.
EPA's new direction
In the late 2000s, first came $4.00 gas at the pump. Then came "Green." As the color of the year became regulatory policy, this was translated into a core focus on pollution prevention through energy efficiency. The concept was hardly new to this industry, but the widespread greening of America has produced a bevy of funded mandates and new ways that companies can meet regulations (and save money) by reducing power consumption of their processes. EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson set the following guiding principles for her agency regulators:
- Promote common-sense strategies that encourage investment in energy efficiency and updated technologies
- Use similar strategies to capture multiple pollutants
- Set clean, achievable standards while maintaining maximum flexibility on how to get there
- Seek input from citizens, industry, affected entities, other stakeholders, and partners in state, local and tribal governments.
· Set the standards that make the most sense – focusing on getting the most meaningful results through the most cost-effective measures.
The agency plans to continue to educate business and the citizenry about energy conservation. The agency believes that the largest impact on carbon emission control can come from Americans using less energy. According to a report from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, funding for energy efficiency programs will increase by 250 to 400 percent by 2020 and is expected to provide a savings of electrical demand by up to 8.6 percent.
The future
The EPA has set in motion plans to reduce a number of emission controls and more are in the works. Many of the coming rule changes are to meet requirements established by the courts and many are mandated by the rules. A glimpse of that schedule can be seen in Figure 5. The planned steps will set the pace for other nations to follow. http://www.pollutionengineering.com/Articles/Cover_Story/BNP_GUID_9-5-2006_A_10000000000001058826.. |
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Dear Reader, Air quality is influenced by many factors – man-made pollution being one of them. Air pollution consists of hazardous substances in the air that can increase your chances of experiencing health problems if exposed to them. The two most common pollutants are ozone (smog) and particulate matter (pollen, soot, dust, etc).
Air pollution comes from many different sources: factories, power plants, local industries, incinerators, cars, buses, planes, trucks and naturally occurring sources such as wind-blown dust.
Everyone can be affected by poor air quality. However, children and those with chronic respiratory problems are the most sensitive to air pollution. Children breathe more rapidly and inhale more pollution per pound of body weight than adults. Therefore, their lungs have a greater chance for being exposed to harmful air pollutants. Childhood asthma is on the increase nationally, and environmental pollutants may contribute to this trend. People with chronic respiratory problems experience an aggravation of their systems with air pollution.
www.Health.westchestergov.com/air-quality
Best regards,
Jay Klaus
JKlaus@KlausEquipment.com
Klaus Equipment Company
President |
Klaus Equipment Company
Phone: 724-444-3420
Fax: 724-444-3425
2866 West Bardonner Road,
Gibsonia, PA 15044
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