Biden EPA to issue power plant rules that lean on carbon capture

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government will put carbon emissions into natural gas-fired power plants as the Joe Biden administration enacts new rules to help decarbonize the power sector within 12 years, sources said. may soon require the introduction of technology to capture

The Environmental Protection Agency is set to release standards for new and existing power plants as early as this week, which account for about a quarter of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, two sources said. The rule superseded former President Donald Trump’s American Clean Energy Rule and former President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan, both of which were overturned by the courts.

Clean Air Act experts and industry representatives in talks with the EPA said the standard, which has been in the works for more than a year, is an indication of the potential for plants to reduce emissions through carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. should be based on gender.

Utility companies may need to decide whether to build new baseload gas plants using CCS technology or zero-emission renewable energy. The state creates plans to bring factories into compliance.

“These standards have the potential to level the playing field between new gas plants and new renewables,” said Thomas Schuester, director of the Pennsylvania chapter of the Sierra Club. New gas plants aren’t paying for their carbon dioxide emissions, so the rule could make it harder for them to compete with solar and wind power.

Biden has pledged to decarbonize the power industry by 2035. According to the Clean Air Act, standards should be based on “best systems of emission reduction”, technologies deemed affordable and technically feasible.

The proposal reflects two major developments to make the rule legally defensible. For one, a Supreme Court ruling last July barred the EPA from mandating system-wide shifts in power generation, but allowed it to issue power plant-specific rules.

Second, the Inflation Reduction Act created tax credits to make carbon capture and hydrogen more affordable and affirmed the EPA’s authority to regulate power plants. The legislation provides over $100 billion in clean power tax incentives, including a 70% increase in credits per tonne of carbon captured and sequestered.

“If you want to make a new fossil, [plant], it needs to control its emissions, said Lisa Lynch, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Federal Legal Group. According to Lynch, existing technology can capture and store about 90% of our carbon footprint.

Lynch said the EPA has set different standards for power plants, applying tougher measures to plants that run constantly and easier measures to “peaker” plants that run when demand is high. may apply, Lynch said.

cleaner power

According to U.S. Energy Information Administration figures, fossil fuels will account for more than 60% of U.S. electricity generation in 2022, with 60% coming from gas and 40% coming from coal. Renewable energy accounts for 21.5%, with nuclear power accounting for the remainder.

The EIA expects 54% (21GW) of the new generation to come from solar power and 14% from natural gas (7.5GW) this year.

Federal utility TVA has the most planned gas capacity at 5GW, with investor-owned Duke Energy (DUK.N) planning 3GW.

TVA’s portfolio over the next few decades will include “resources such as natural gas that complement its diversity without sacrificing speed or reliability” and carbon-free resources, the spokesperson said. said.

Duke plans to make natural gas part of that mix, but “not as a baseload generation, but as a peaking/ramping resource over time to offset the variability of renewable resources.” It was put into operation,” said a spokesperson.

Some industry representatives, in comments to the EPA last year, indicated they didn’t think power plant standards should be based on carbon capture and storage, and the National Mining Association said it was “not enough.” It’s not a “tested technology”. The group cited the failure of a Texas project called Petra Nova, which was shut down in 2020.

Utilities Southern Company (SO.N), which is phasing out large coal power plants, said new gas turbines should be prioritized “to protect America’s electricity needs.”

Southern, which also runs the National Carbon Capture Center with the Department of Energy, said commercial deployment of carbon capture technology is “years away” despite potential cost savings from the Inflation Reduction Act.

Reported by Valerie Volcovici.Edited by Timothy Gardner and David Gregorio

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