Ruling: CO2 Must be Regulated
Great news from last week -- it's a good sign that power plants will have to regulate CO2.
On Nov. 13, the Environmental Protection Agency's Environmental Appeals Board ruled that EPA had no valid reason for refusing to limit from new coal-fired power plants the carbon dioxide emissions that cause global warming. The decision means that virtually all new and proposed coal plants nationwide must go back and address their carbon dioxide emissions.
This decision stemmed from the Sierra Club going before the Environmental Appeals Board in May of 2008 to request that the air permit for Deseret Power Electric Cooperative's proposed waste coal-fired power plant in Utah be overturned because it failed to require any controls on carbon dioxide pollution. Deseret Power's 110 MW Bonanza plant would have emitted 3.37 million tons of carbon dioxide each year.
Read more about the decision in this Associated Press article.
Want to get more involved in the push for clean energy? Check out the Sierra Club's National Coal Campaign and while there, take a look at the list of all coal-fired power plants (proposed, blocked and approved) across the US.
President-Elect Obama on Climate Change
Did you see President-Elect Barack Obama's speech to the Governors' Global Climate Summit yesterday? Watch the video of the speech on YouTube, or you can read the transcript here.