Remarks for CERAWeek About EPA’s Approach to Deliver Certainty for Power Sector and Ensure Significant Public Health Benefits, As Prepared for Delivery
Michael Regan
Houston, Texas
Thank you, Dan. It’s great to be here at CERA. Thanks so much for having me.
Tomorrow marks one year since I was sworn into this office, and let me just say, it’s exciting to be here – in person – at a conference like this. It’s amazing how much the world can change from one year to the next.
I’ve been on the road a lot this past year, getting out of Washington, D.C. as much as I can, so that I can meet with people who have a real stake in the decisions EPA makes – folks like all of you, of course, who are looking for signals from the agency, state and local leaders, but also communities, people who are on the frontlines of pollution, who have the most to lose and everything to gain from the actions we take.
The power sector is central to America’s economic growth and competitiveness. We all depend on a resilient power sector for affordable and reliable electricity.
I believe it’s especially important to have this conversation at this moment – with our economy on the rebound from the pandemic, an unprovoked war abroad that threatens our energy prices here at home, and the opportunity to define the energy future on the global stage.
I want to be clear that EPA and this Administration are committed to the integrated priorities of ensuring U.S. energy security, creating good-paying jobs, and protecting people from pollution. But while we continue to see the important leadership you are demonstrating to reduce pollution, power plants remain the largest stationary sources of harmful pollutants like nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide... projected to emit more than 1.2 million tons of these pollutants in 2023 alone.
Every year, pollution from power plants causes 8,000 fine particle and ozone-related premature deaths, tens of thousands of new asthma cases, thousands of heart attacks, and millions of lost school and work days.
The adverse health effects alone from power plant-related air pollution are valued at $80 billion per year, and that is before we consider the costs of climate change.
And we know that health impacts and outcomes are worse for overburdened and underserved communities. In fact, more than 2,600 fossil-fuel fired plants – or 73% of the nation’s fossil fuel-fired generation capacity – are in communities of color or low-income communities.
Communities located near these plants are rightly concerned about the effects of these facilities on their health and wellbeing. As the EPA Administrator, and as a parent, I am too, and I know many of you are as well because you have told me directly.
Our nation’s clean air and environmental laws, and our responsibility to the American people, require EPA to take action to address these impacts… and to do so in a way that allows our economy to thrive.
History has proven that protecting people’s health and ensuring economic prosperity aren’t mutually exclusive – but they actually go hand in hand.
Since the implementation of the Clean Air Act in 1970, we’ve seen key pollutants drop by nearly 80 percent while the economy has grown by more than 270 percent.
At the same time, there has been tremendous progress both domestically and internationally when it comes to transitioning to clean energy.
Over the past two decades, thanks to much of your leadership, the cost of renewable energy technology has plummeted – making it competitive with existing coal and gas generation:
- The average cost of wind has declined by 70% while the cost of utility scale-solar has declined by 80% since 2010.
Today, renewable energy is the fastest growing form of electricity, and new solar and wind have dominated the new power plant construction queue recently:
- Solar generation has grown 100x since 2010, and wind has grown 300% – both achieving record paces.
While coal power plants are facing headwinds because they’re the oldest in the fleet, with roughly 80% of capacity more than 30 years old, they’re simply unable to compete with newer technologies that are dominating current market investments.
The power sector is becoming cleaner because technology and markets are us leading there – YOU are leading us there, because like anyone who wants to be competitive in the future, you’re aligning investments accordingly.
This is a pivotal moment for the sector, and EPA is ready to seize it.
As an agency, we’re facing a mix of statutory deadlines and court ordered deadlines – and in the past, these rules would have landed one at a time at your doorstep, creating uncertainty for investors.
That’s why we’re looking at the full suite of opportunities to marry a range of EPA authorities. We don’t have to overly rely on any one policy or rulemaking to achieve our mission and ensure affordable and reliable energy.
An integrated and coordinated approach allows us to tackle the full array of threats that power plants pose to clean air, safe water, and healthy land. It also provides greater transparency, regulatory certainty for long-term investments, opportunities to reduce compliance complexity, and the right signals to create market and price stability.
Folks, I’ve thought long and hard about this. I know this is complex. We think there’s a way to do it that protects public health and continues to give YOU the certainty YOU need to expedite a clean energy future.
2022 will be an important year for all of us! One that helps to put our nation on a course that keeps our country energy independent and globally competitive.
So, let’s talk about all the things we’re going to do together.
For starters, in January, we issued a proposal to reaffirm the scientific, economic, and legal underpinnings of the 2012 Mercury and Air Toxics Standards for power plants, which require significant reductions of mercury, acid gases, and other harmful pollutants. As part of that action, we’re also seeking information from the public to determine whether any new developments could warrant revisiting the MATS Residual Risk and Technology Review the Agency completed in 2020 by the prior administration.
MATS delivers up to $90 billion of benefits per year and prevents up to 11,000 premature deaths, affirming that what’s good for the environment and public health is also good for the economy.
I also recently signed a proposed federal plan that would cut pollution from power plants and industrial sources that significantly contribute to unhealthy levels of smog for over a million Americans who live downwind. We’ll have more details to share on that tomorrow.
Our proposal would help states fully resolve their Clean Air Act “good neighbor” obligations for the 2015 Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards, enhancing public health and environmental protections regionally and for local communities.
Later this spring, we’ll be releasing for public comment and finalizing a white paper summarizing readily available information on control techniques and measures with the potential to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions from new natural gas combustion turbines.
While the white paper doesn’t set policy or standard – it frames the public dialogue on approaches to reduce climate pollution from new gas-fired units.
And later this year, we’ll be taking a fresh look at our options for reducing carbon emissions from both new and existing power plants. EPA is obligated to put in place emission guidelines for carbon dioxide pollution from existing power plants under section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. We’re committed to building on the lessons of our prior efforts in this area and engaging a broad range of stakeholders. As we do that, we’ll also propose revisions to the greenhouse gas standards for new power plants under section 111(b).
We’ll also be looking to propose a legacy Coal Combustion Residual surface impoundment rule, finalize the CCR Federal Permit rule, and propose supplemental effluent guidelines.
All these actions are driven first and foremost by our assessment of the most pressing public health and environmental challenges associated with the power sector.
They will also put our commitment to environmental justice into action by improving the health of already overburdened communities that reside near power plants and the health of communities hundreds of miles downwind that are also affected by our reliance on fossil fuels.
But equally as important is the recognition that our actions will be taking place at a time when states, power companies, and communities across the country are already taking ambitious steps to reduce power sector pollution and accelerate deployment of clean energy technologies.
Just in the past month, we’ve seen tremendous leadership throughout the sector, and I want to highlight some of the most recent examples.
Georgia Power – last month declared its intent to retire 12 of its coal plants by 2028, and the remainder by 2035.
That announcement was closely followed by the announcement of Duke Energy from my home state of North Carolina, which also declared its intent to retire its entire coal fleet by 2035.
And recently, the Minnesota PUC greenlit Xcel Energy’s proposal to lower carbon emissions by more than 85% from electricity provided to customers in the Upper Midwest region. By 2032, Xcel also pledged to generate more than 80% of its electricity from carbon-free sources.
Examples like these prove that cleaner, renewable energy is affordable AND reliable. They represent sound, long-term investments that support a growing economy while reducing the pollution that harms our health and jeopardizes our climate.
That’s why, as we take steps to fulfill our responsibility to protect public health, we also want to act in a way that amplifies the leadership and innovation we’re seeing from power companies, state regulators, investors, and communities – and that safeguards reliable and affordable electricity for all Americans.
If EPA’s actions unfold while the rest of the federal family, leading states, and leading firms in the sector are mobilizing their tools and resources, then our actions and the clean-energy investment signals they send, will work as they should – hand in glove.
As we move forward with these conversations, let me share with you with some principles that will underlie the agency’s strategy.
First, we will continue our commitment to transparency and an open dialogue, ensuring that we have frequent engagement with the stakeholders most affected by EPA’s actions in this area.
Second, public health will always be our North Star. We’ll never lose sight of the need to protect the most vulnerable communities that live in the shadows of smokestacks and breathe in unhealthy air.
Third, ensuring that power producers can continue to provide reliable and affordable electricity is paramount – that means providing state and federal energy regulators, power companies, and grid operators with well-timed information about our actions and making every effort to have coherent compliance deadlines.
As we execute our strategy, we’ll ensure that the actions we take are durable and provide certainty to investors.
Finally, as I’ve said since day one, the way to create strong, long-lasting policy is to work hand in hand with partners at all levels of government – states, Tribes, and municipalities that continue to demonstrate impressive leadership.
And we’ll look across the federal family in this mission – I am working directly with Secretary Granholm at the Department of Energy and FERC leadership to synchronize their infrastructure investments with EPA’s regulatory strategy, Secretary Tom Vilsack at USDA to ensure the financing exists for our rural coops to invest, Secretary Marty Walsh at the Department of Labor to ensure we understand the impacts our actions are having on labor, and Gina Raimondo at the Department of Commerce to ensure the Economic Development Administration aids the transition around energy communities.
As a nation, we face a variety of interconnected challenges – but the solutions are also tied together. We’re coming up on the 5-year anniversary of Hurricane Harvey, a climate-fueled disaster that the people of Houston are still grappling with today. At the same time, too many overburdened communities in Houston are breathing dangerous, toxic air. Thanks to leadership in this sector and EPA regulations working side by side, a zero-emissions future is well within our grasp.
Folks, I believe this is a moment unlike any other – one of those defining moments in our history. The decisions we make today will have lasting consequences for public health, the economy, climate, national security, and our ability to compete and win in the 21st century.
We can’t let this moment pass us by. Let’s seize it together.
Thank you.