Critics called the state’s plan, which rejected a request to cut sulfur emissions at coal plants, a “do nothing” strategy. The EPA now wants six power plants to slash emissions by 80,000 tons.
The view from Guadalupe Peak, the highest point in Texas, is often obscured by haze from both local and regional air pollution sources. Credit: Martha Pskowski/Inside Climate News.
By Martha Pskowskids, Inside Climate News
The National Parks Conservation Association Texas Young Leaders Advocacy Council and other environmental groups are pushing state and federal regulators to take aggressive action to eliminate air pollution at national parks through the Environmental Protection Agency’s Regional Haze Rule. Issued in 1999 under the Clean Air Act, the rule calls for state and federal regulators to work together to improve visibility in national parks and wilderness areas.
States submit progress reports every five years and update their action plans, known as implementation plans, every 10 years. Each plan is divided into an initial phase that covers the largest individual polluters and a second one that focuses on ongoing emissions reductions from a range of sources.
In July 2021, Texas submitted its updated implementation plan to the EPA. But in April 2023,
the EPA announced that the plan’s first phase was inadequate because it did not include the best available technology for reducing sulfur dioxide and particulate matter.
The agency proposed a new strategy for Texas that would require six coal plants, all major contributors to haze, to reduce their emissions of sulfur dioxide. The public comment period on that proposed rule closed on Aug. 2. The EPA has not announced when it will release the final rule.
Environmental advocates are calling on the EPA to similarly reject Texas’s plan for the second phase of the haze rule, submitted in July 2021. They also want Texas to implement more pollution controls in the second phase for the numerous oil and gas drilling sites contributing to air pollution at national parks.
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