Yesterday Hg-ATME reported the agreement reached in Pennsylvania settling one of the most contentious battles over mercury emission legislation in the country. It is an apparent victory for environmentalists, citizens in general and everyone downwind of PA coal burning power plants, of which there are many.
Even yesterday we alluded to possible on-going objections by some of the more staunch opponents of this compromise in the PA senate. And today we learn what course that objection may take.
From The Patriot-News / pennlive.com
State Sen. Mary Jo White, R-Venango, chairman of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, and Sen. Raphael Musto, D-Luzerne, are ending their efforts to block them -- at least for now. Both had been vigorous opponents of the regulations.
In a letter to Secretary of Environmental Resources Kathleen A. McGinty, White and Musto said they are "confident" they could have garnered legislative support for a resolution to disapprove the mercury regulations, but they concluded it would be "unproductive" to do so.
It is doubtful they could have taken that tact, as even (o)ne of their chief allies in industry was Douglas Biden of the Electric Power Generation Association in Harrisburg. Biden said in essence that White didn't have the votes.
"I did not expect either Senator White or Senator Musto to start a resolution to try to stop them," he said. "I can't disagree with their political judgment. A bill would simply have been a 'just say no' statement."
However these two state representatives are going to try to add to this legislation one of the key points of contention all along and that is "Trading of Toxic Emission Credits".
White and Musto said in their letter to McGinty that they intend to introduce and advance new legislation to impose mercury-emission standards stronger than the EPA rules, but weaker than those of DEP. In essence, every power plant would be required to achieve a 90 percent reduction in mercury emissions by 2015, but they would be allowed to trade emission credits to go beyond that.
Biden said DEP was really seeking a 95 percent to 98 percent reduction, and the only way for some power plants to meet that standard was to buy emission credits.
I have been following this issue for a while and nowhere have I seen anyone in any State propose 95% or 98% reductions. This just sounds like rhetoric to get the trading issue back on the table for discussion. As I said in earlier posts, for Pennsylvania, this is one debate that just won't go away.
Even though it appears the PA law would require all plants in PA to acheive the 90% reduction, these senators want PA utilities to be able to sell credits on the open market thus weakening the overall effect of their reductions. It is not good enough for progressive states like PA to limit emissions within their own state it is imperative that they do not allow utilities in other states to buy their good efforts and allow the mercury into the air elsewhere. What good does it do if they sell the credits to Ohio and the mercury comes right back into PA?
The complete Patriot-News article can be read here.
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Agreed. Its clear that Senators White and Musto care not for cleaning up the problem, and more for their buds in the utility industry that want to rake in the cash via the trading scam.
The PA rule doesn't require a 98% reduction. The fact that Biden coughed up in this article that MJW didn't have the votes is a coup. She doesn't have the votes to even get something out of her own committee, let alone passed in both houses, and she knows it. This posturing is a waste of time and resources, and meanwhile PA should be focused on other matters of critical importance.
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