Deadline Passes, 22 States Eye Tougher Mercury Emissions Rules

AP Story - International Herald Tribune

As the deadline passed Friday afternoon, 22 states have stated their intentions of being tougher on mercury emissions than the Federal CAMR regulations. As part of the CAMR each state had until Nov 17th to say how they would enforce the Federal rules or how they would go even further and enforce some stricter version of their own.

The 22 states listed as having tougher mercury-cutting plans than the federal government are: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.

The rest of the states are roughly split among those accepting EPA's regulations as sufficient and those that are still trying to figure out what they plan to do, according to Dan Riedinger, a spokesman for Edison Electric Institute, a utility trade association that favors the EPA approach.

Although the deadline passed several states are still grappling and an extension seems all but assured. Read the whole AP article here.