Our Take, with Doug Sheridan
“This is just more blunt-force climate activism from overzealous gov't bureaucrats who neither understand nor care about the damage their decisions will do to America's grid and economy.”
The WSJ Editorial Board writes, EPA last May proposed a rule to force fossil-fuel generators to use carbon capture and green hydrogen to reduce CO2 emissions. Given the problems with these embryonic technologies, the rule is effectively a death sentence for fossil-fuel plants.
It turns out federal agencies agree. Comments show experts and lawyers at other agencies raised serious concerns about the rule.
To wit, Section 111 of the Clean Air Act says the EPA can regulate pollutants from power plants only through the “best system of emission reduction” that is “adequately demonstrated.” Green hydrogen and carbon capture don’t meet the criterion.
As one commenter noted, “hydrogen combustion has not been adequately demonstrated nation-wide for utility scale power generation.” Blending hydrogen into natural gas also results in “significant increases in NOx emissions” that “would offset some of the benefits of reduced CO2 emissions.”
The same commenter stressed “there are issues regarding the integrity of hydrogen supply and whether a consistent and reliable marketplace for hydrogen will emerge” and “a specific compliance date is not appropriate.” EPA’s proposed rule nonetheless sets hard-and-fast deadlines.
Another hurdle “is overcoming the physics of hydrogen’s steep energy penalty.” It takes three to five MWs of power to separate one MW of hydrogen-equivalent fuel for energy production. This energy could be “better used directly serving load and maintaining grid reliability.”
CCS is no more ready for prime time. EPA has issued permits for only two wells to store CO2 underground. The permitting time for both was about three years, though “the entire permitting process can take up to six years including time for geologic investigation.”
And CCS uses about “20-25% of the electricity generated by the unit, resulting in less power available to the grid” and “will adversely impact available reserve margins, exacerbating grid reliability projections by diverting up to one-fifth of the energy output to power” the technology.
And CCS hasn’t met the legal threshold for being considered a “best system of emission reduction” since “it has not been adequately demonstrated.” The technology also remains “prohibitively expensive” even with IRA subsidies.
To Sum It Up 1: EPA knows these technologies aren’t close to being feasible or cost-effective. But it plans to mandate them anyway to force fossil-fuel plants to shut down. They’ll worry about the consequences later.
To Sum It Up 2: EPA’s rule would curtail power from reliable gas-generators at the same time as the agency’s EV mandate ramps up and increases electricity demand. Does the EPA know what its doing?
Our Take:
This is just more blunt-force climate activism from overzealous gov't bureaucrats who neither understand nor care about the damage their decisions will do to America's grid and economy. When did we become such a careless and dogmatic nation?