How Dumb Assed can these regulators be? ‘Clean Coal’ Means No Coal

The EPA does nothing but enhance its own environment and reulated the rest of us into oblivion.
Kill off the EPA!

‘Clean Coal’ Means No Coal - Nash Keune - National Review Online

Obama the candidate tries to appear friendly to all energy sources.

By Nash Keune

May 25, 2012

wo weeks ago, the Obama campaign quietly edited its website to highlight the president’s support for “clean coal.” In place of a section for “energy efficiency” with no mention of coal, BarackObama.com now boasts that the stimulus package “invested substantially in carbon capture and sequestration research.” 

The administration’s position on coal has, shall we say, evolved. In 2001, the EPA released an endangerment finding stating that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide threaten public health and the environment by contributing to climate change and that therefore they could be regulated under the Clean Air Act. Since then, as Bryan Walsh noted in Time magazine, the EPA has “embark[ed] on what could be the most far-reaching environmental regulatory scheme in American history.”  

Already, 57 coal-fired plants have closed owing to the EPA’s regulations, according to the National Mining Association. Supporters insist that policies favoring renewable energy sources will lead to lower costs. However, the burden of these coal regulations has contributed to a $300 increase in the average household’s electricity bill over the last five years, despite the substantial stimulus investment “in carbon capture and sequestration research.” Some of this increased cost can be attributed to more demand for electricity. But USA Today reports that the rise in cost is due in part to “the expense of replacing old power plants, including heavily polluting — but cheap to operate — coal plants that don’t meet federal clean air requirements.”  

It’s impossible to predict exactly how much these regulations will cost, as the standards themselves are likely to change. Under the Clean Air Act, when an outside group sues an energy producer for supposedly overstepping an emission standard, the EPA can register a consent agreement, which settles the suit in exchange for toughening the standard industry-wide.

This is one of the problems with, for example, the EPA’s new, first-ever fracking regulations. Drilling companies are required to install emission-limiting technology, which most already use. The Wall Street Journal editorial page has called the EPA’s regulatory restraint on this front a “miracle,” adding that “most wellheads and pipelines already exceed the EPA benchmark.” Once the EPA establishes regulations, however, they are bound to become more stringent over time.

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