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DP&L awaits new clear air rules

EPA proposes regulations to settle a lawsuit by activists.

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By John Nolan, Staff Writer 1:28 AM Sunday, October 25, 2009

A court settlement between environmental activists and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for regulation to reduce potentially toxic air pollution emissions from coal-burning power plants could have consequences for Dayton Power and Light Co., which generates almost all of its electricity by burning coal.

The EPA said it will propose the regulations by March 2011 and finalize them by November 2011. One focus would be to reduce emissions of mercury, which can be particularly dangerous for children and women of child-bearing age, according to the environmental organizations which reached the settlement with the EPA.

The organizations had sued the EPA in federal court in Washington, D.C., accusing the agency of failing to meet the Clean Air Act’s deadline for issuing regulations controlling toxic air pollution from power plants. The settlement, filed in the Washington court on Thursday, Oct. 22, will become final after the EPA publishes the terms in the Federal Register for a 30-day public comment period.

DP&L will await the EPA’s new regulations, said JoAnne Rau, the Dayton-based utility’s director of environmental and safety management.

“We don’t know what pollutants are going to be covered, and how tight those restrictions are going to be,” Rau said in a telephone interview Friday.

DP&L is hoping that its $600 million investment in new emission-reducing scrubber technology at its biggest coal-fired power plants — the Stuart and Killen plants along the Ohio River — will allow the company to meet the new EPA regulations, Rau said.

DP&L put those scrubbers into operation in 2007 and 2008 to meet more stringent federal air pollution control requirements. The emissions that those devices reduce include mercury, Rau said.

The company burns coal to generate virtually all the electricity for its customers’ day-to-day demands. During peak demands, DP&L supplements that output by generating from natural gas-fired plants.

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