The proposal would change what triggers the requirement for older power plants to install new pollution controls.
Cheap fuel and mass-produced cars led to a shortage of road space and the need for pollution controls.
Pielke noted that the success of the pollution controls also means that the industry "probably can go further" in reducing leaks.
But the Bush administration announced yesterday new rules for the program that make it easier for plants to avoid installing pollution controls.
Throw in the cost of scrubbers and other required pollution controls, and many smaller coal plants will have to be shut down, Bergstrom says.
By the way, installing those pollution controls created jobs because they went to manufacturers to build the controls and to Americans to install them.
Those that thrive will be those that use modern pollution controls.
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It has withheld permits for coal mines, tightened pollution controls for power plants that use coal, and is in the process of drafting regulations on greenhouse gases.
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The business news starts with a change in pollution controls.
It seems that the slim (and volatile) profit margins of this cutthroat business make it tempting for players to keep pollution controls to the lowest levels they can get away with.
Since GISS is all about the surface temperature, that suggests (to rational thinkers at least) that some portion of the surface temperature rise post 1975 is due to pollution controls being enacted.
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But the closure of such plants has also been hastened by the availability of cheap natural gas from fracking, which makes coal less viable economically, especially when utilities must invest in pollution controls.
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The agency is currently taking a hard look at whether utilities in recent years have modified their power plants with the latest pollution controls, and it has taken legal action against some power companies.
But in March 2005 USA Today reported on Langley's sordid past: In 1999 he had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and commercial bribery in connection with a penny stock called Pollution Controls International.
He said new facilities would not be required to have mercury pollution controls for five years after the treaty came into force, with existing facilities given a decade before they had to begin their control efforts.
In a mid-April report on greenhouse emissions, the agency now says that tighter pollution controls instituted by the industry resulted in an average annual decrease of 41.6 million metric tons of methane emissions from 1990 through 2010, or more than 850 million metric tons overall.
In a second, unanimous ruling involving Duke Energy (nyse: DKE - news - people ), the justices said that before making major modifications to coal-fired power plants, plant owners must have a permit, which would require that the facility be outfitted with anti-pollution controls.
In fact, consolidation is happening because the government believes it can ensure better pollution oversight, labor conditions and quality control of production processes in large state-run enterprises than in the multitude of tiny private businesses that cut corners in pollution controls and make mistakes like getting melamine into the dairy supply chain.
Approximately 1, 100 such units at more than 450 existing power plants emit 48 tons of mercury into the air each year, with 11 tons of that deposited on to U.S. soil and waters, says EPA. Those plants also release arsenic, lead and other heavy metals, all of which are considered hazardous and are therefore subject to clean air laws that require those facilities to use modern pollution controls.
If successful, controls would be put in place to prevent light pollution.
On Sunday, the Shanghai Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau said the Johnson Controls plant in an area of the city called Kangqiao had a role in lead pollution that sickened 49 children.
At the time, he cited findings from a Shanghai testing firm that determined that Johnson Controls had abided by local laws and wasn't the source of the local lead pollution.
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