From the Daily Caller
Nick Pope
Contributor
The Biden-Harris administration says its tough power plant rules won't harm long-term power reliability, but four grid operators expressed the exact opposite view in a legal brief filed Friday.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized tough emissions rules for U.S. power plants in April, saying at the time that they would “improve public health without affecting reliable electricity delivery.” However, four major regional grid operators, in an amicus brief supporting red states’ legal challenges to the rules, made the exact opposite argument and made clear that the rules, if enforced, would jeopardize Americans’ reliability The ability of the ground to obtain sufficient power.
“The brief overview they provided detailed that without additional modifications, the rule's compliance schedule and related provisions would be unfeasible and destined to trigger the pace of premature retirement of generating units with critical reliability attributes at the time. When due to When the growth of the digital economy requires such generation to support growing electricity demand, and when there is a need to ensure adequate backup generation to support the increasing amount of intermittent renewable energy generation,” the grid operator said in its amicus curiae the briefing reads. “This inevitable and foreseeable early retirement decision due to the rule's timeline will place significant stress on each joint agency. [independent system operators’] / [regional transmission organizations’] The ability to maintain grid reliability to meet the needs of citizens and the nation's economy. (Related: Grid operators warn Democrats’ climate agenda is pushing populous blue states toward blackouts)
The Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), PJM, Southwest Power Pool (SPP) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) teamed up to submit the brief. According to the briefing, the four players collectively serve 156 million customers.
Specifically, the EPA rule will require existing coal plants to control 90% of their emissions by 2032 if they want to continue operating beyond 2039, and will also require new natural gas plants to do the same to continue operating after 2039. The EPA is essentially requiring power plants to use carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology to reduce emissions, which four grid operators argue is too costly and unproven to be mandated in such a tight timeframe. implement.
The EPA's conclusion that CCS is the “optimal emissions reduction system” is also questionable, and that the decision's compliance deadlines were “based on overly ambitious and undersupported assumptions about CCS commercialization target dates,” and grid operators in their argued the briefing. “Those ones [best system of emissions reduction] Decisions then drive compliance rates and timelines, which in turn can lead to premature retirement of generation sources, threatening grid reliability even before the rule's compliance date.
The claims made by the grid operator in the briefing are completely inconsistent with what the EPA says about its rules.
“Today, April 25, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a series of final rules to reduce pollution from fossil fuel power plants to protect all communities from pollution and improve public health without interrupting the delivery of reliable electricity,” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency it said on the day it announced the final rule. “These rules, finalized under various agencies including the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, will significantly reduce climate, air, water, and land pollution from the power sector and deliver on Biden- The Harris Administration’s commitments protect public health, promote environmental justice, and address the climate crisis.
Grid experts similarly warn that electricity demand is expected to increase significantly due to de facto electric vehicle (EV) mandates and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), while the EPA's rules will harm power reliability. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Commissioner Mark Christie also sounded the alarm about the possibility of a severe power crisis in the U.S. in the near future as demand increases, reliable supply is phased out, and not enough, reliable capacity comes online to offset those Subtraction.
The EPA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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