The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) proposal calls for the US Environmental Protection Agency to use its authority under the Clean Air Act to set standards for existing power plants—America’s largest source of carbon emissions that fuel climate change – that would increase the use of green power generation.
The group claims it plan enables states and electricity plant owners to use a wide range of existing technologies, including energy efficiency and renewable energy sources, to meet carbon pollution standards. States would also have broad flexibility to design their own plans to meet the standards.
“The President put climate change on the national agenda, and NRDC’s plan shows how the United States can make big reductions in carbon pollution that drive climate change, with a flexible approach that promotes clean energy investments and delivers big benefits for Americans’ health,” said Peter Lehner, NRDC’s executive director.
“This year’s ravaging heat waves, drought, wildfires and Superstorm Sandy underscore why the nation must tackle head-on the biggest source of dangerous carbon pollution now.”
NRDC argues that its proposal shows how the United States can ’dramatically reduce’ pollution from power plants that are responsible for 40% of the nation’s carbon pollution.
“We are overturning the conventional wisdom that reducing carbon pollution through the Clean Air Act would be ineffective and expensive,” said Dan Lashof, NRDC’s director of climate and clean air programs, and a principal author of the plan.
“We show that the EPA can work with states and power companies to make large pollution reductions, by setting system-wide standards, rather than smokestack-by-smokestack ones, and by giving power companies and states the freedom to choose the most cost-saving means of compliance.
“The impact is huge: our proposal would eliminate hundreds of millions of tons of carbon pollution, save thousands of lives and stimulate a surge in clean energy and energy efficiency investments,” Lashof said, “all at a lower cost than many would expect.”
Under NRDC’s proposal, the EPA would use Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act to set state-specific carbon emission rates that reflect the diversity of the nation’s electricity sector and fuel mix.
