Attorneys general in 25 states, including Florida’s Ashley Moody, have sent an emergency appeal to the United States Supreme Court asking it to immediately halt a Biden administration rule that they say threatens to shutter the country’s remaining fleet of coal-fired power plants.
The emergency appeal to stay the Environmental Protection Agency’s plans to require strict greenhouse gas emissions standards is pending before Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts because the states say the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is sitting on a number of lawsuits without a decision, and that more time is needed before implementing a decision about technologies like carbon capture and storage.
Roberts, having appeal jurisdiction over the D.C. Circuit on what is commonly referred to as the “shadow docket,” could deny the request, send it along to the full court, or issue a brief temporary stay while the matter is further briefed on an expedited schedule.
The appeal, led by Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita and West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, said that the EPA has overstepped its authority, taking away Congress’ power, as it mandates greenhouse gas regulations that are impossible to meet because the technology either doesn’t exist or would be so cost-prohibitive that it would make using coal impossible.
The appeal to the nation’s highest court also says that because of future pollution targets, energy companies need to make investment and permitting decisions in advance and that the EPA cannot meet those timelines itself, risking millions of sunken or lost costs for public utilities that would be passed along to consumers.
While not mentioning Montana’s Colstrip Units 3 and 4, the issues strike directly at the heart of the battle to keep the aging coal-fired plant in southern Montana open. The lawsuit said that the only way to keep such plants open is through carbon capture and storage, but that technology has never been proven on an industrial scale, and furthermore the limited tests require heavy subsidies.
In Florida, coal is no longer a major factor in electricity generation. As 0f 2022, and coal-fired power plants supplied about 6% of the energy supply, down from 36% in 2001, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Attorneys argue that if the Biden administration’s rule is allowed to continue, it will mean that hundreds of megawatts will be forced offline, leading to power shortages during critical weather during the summer and winter.
“Among other things, the rule imposes inadequately demonstrated technologies on unworkable timeframes, effectively squeezing plants into retirement,” the appeal said. “Relatedly, it causes serious immediate harms by either pushing plants into binding commitments for retirement or pressing them to start spending large sums to hit compliance dates.”
The rule would force 90% of carbon dioxide from the plants to be captured and stored by 2032 and 40% of the plants to establish co-firing with natural gas by 2030.
“[The rules] are really a backdoor avenue to forcing coal plants out of existence — a major question that no clear congressional authority permits. The rule cannot stand,” the legal brief said.
Carbon capture and storage
Many states have invested in the promise of carbon capture and storage as one way to mitigate the greenhouse gases produced by burning coal. The idea is to capture the flue gas and then pipe it either to underground storage or sell it, thereby reducing the amount of greenhouse gases released into the environment.
However, the states argue that even though the EPA has adopted standards and rules that embrace the carbon capture and storage technology, the technology has not been proven successful or economically feasible.
“The EPA recites a list of CCS projects and operations, saying there are ‘at least 15 operating CCS projects in the U.S., and another 121 that are under construction or in advanced stages of development,’ but this recitation is quantity over quality,” the brief said. “Nearly all named CCS operations are from the industrial rather than the energy sector — an important difference because the energy sector has unique demands like reliability. These facilities are all a fraction of the size of power-generating units; none of them are close to scale.”
Furthermore, the states warn that new power plants that have carbon capture systems will more than double the construction costs as well as increase operational costs by 35%.
“This expense could double energy prices,” the states warn. “Installing CCS reduces plants’ sellable energy by up to 36% — instantly slashing plants’ ongoing profitability.”
The emergency appeal also said that the carbon capture technology will require plant owners to buy more fuel, increasing the cost to run a plant, and that the start-up times will be affected. They claim the new units will have a hard time operating at low loads.
“The National Center for Carbon Capture estimates the first CCS demonstration projects won’t go online until 2030 to 2032,” the legal filing said.
Carbon-capture technology would also call for thousands of miles of pipeline to transport the carbon for storage or usage. Citing a survey by Princeton, it estimates that 66,000 miles of pipeline are needed, while the EPA estimates 5,000 miles. Using the more conservative EPA estimates, the states point out that power companies would have to invest more than $12.5 billion for the pipelines.
Finally, the states question the market for carbon dioxide generated from the power plants. For example, they note that one of the largest uses for captured carbon dioxide is in enhanced oil recovery, but many states and counties have restrictions on that. According to the briefs, 95% of the captured carbon market is for enhanced oil recovery, leading the states to question whether the market for the product even exists.
“The EPA has no idea how strong that demand is,” the lawsuit said. “It seems imprudent to suppose that many plants will be able to sell carbon. But the sequestration is not much better.”
The appeal said that even the EPA has said that 19 states have no underground storage capacity or very little.
Time is running out
Although many of the goals and targets have deadlines reaching years into the future, the states’ attorneys general say that the permitting, planning, and investment needed to comply with the EPA’s rules will take years and cost states millions (the EPA often delegates regulation and enforcement of federal rules to the states).
In the lawsuit, they say that complying with the rule and enforcing it will eat up staff time on a task that is scientifically as well as economically impossible. Furthermore, the states will have no ability to recover the costs, and any costs public utilities will sink into the mandate could be passed along to consumers.
“It forces producers to decide between launching a Hail Mary bid to squeak by under a painful new regime or just bowing out of the game entirely,” the attorneys general conclude.
The EPA did not comment prior to publication of this story.
–Darrell Ehrlick, Florida Phoenix
Laurel says
I wish that Moody and DeSantis would work for us, the citizens of Florida, instead of the coal, gas and oil industries! My God, can we at least catch up with the present? Can we get out of the dinosaur age? They always back their oil and coal masters. We get stuck with it, and remain oil competitive with the rest of the world. Stupid, and sucky for us, but financially rewarding for the politicians!
FPL (maybe Duke also?) has miles and miles of acres of fields of solar collectors in north Florida and the panhandle. Does anyone really think they will abandon this for the sake of dirty coal? No. They know better. It’s the coal and oil industries that cannot, or absolutely refuse, to get out of the dark ages. If they refuse to adapt, then they can go down the trail of extinction along with the dinosaurs.
Let’s move on!
Skibum says
I have heard statements in recent years from coal company executives who have been coming to terms with the decline of America’s past reliance on coal, and nothing has changed. The coal producers may not all be going out of business, but for the most part, they are not only looking at alternative energy sources, they are innovating and investing in them to sustain the future of their companies. Peter Johnson, Publisher of North American Mining Magazine, said at a mining company event in West Virginia earlier this year which was hosted by that state’s very conservative Republican Gov. Jim Justice, that due to the ever-increasing scope of alternative forms of energy production, the future of coal and its leading uses have been under question and in a state of transition for quite some time now.
I think it is nonsense that red state governors, as well as Trump himself, keep touting the coal industry like it is America’s future when even coal industry experts have stated bluntly that their industry will NEVER be coming back to what it was. All of their bluster is purely partisan politics as usual. It is like a bunch of old men sitting around a table with today’s tech innovators discussing bringing back cassette tape players. Not gonna happen… move on!
Shark says
Maybe Desantis made a deal with t-rump for some of that clean coal.
DaleL says
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is a pipe dream. The easiest CCS system implement on a large scale is to plant acres of trees. Once they are grown, cut them down and bury them. If they are buried long enough and deep enough, they can become coal.
It is not just the CO2 from coal which is bad, the ash from the plants is toxic and radioactive. The fly ash emitted by a coal powered plant carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy. Coal contains small amounts of uranium and thorium, both radioactive elements. When the coal is burned, these elements are concentrated in the ash and also released into the environment.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/
I would increasingly tax the coal industry and use the funds to: 1. promote more nuclear, solar, wind, energy storage, and power transmission. 2. re-employ coal workers in other industries.