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update on EPA rulemaking on 316(b) - fishkills for existing facilities
>
>
>
> This may be of interest to some since fishkills from once-thru cooling systems
> have been discussed on both radsafe and know_nukes.
norm
> Riverkeeper Alliance needs your help identifying examples of fish kills
> associated with power plants. They are looking for examples to include
> in comments on EPA's Proposed Cooling Water Regulation For Existing
> Facilities. Please see the fact sheet below for more information on the
> rulemaking and contact Reed Super at 845-424-4149, ext 224,
> rsuper@riverkeeper.org with your examples or questions.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Fact Sheet
> EPA's Proposed Cooling Water Regulation For Existing Facilities:
>
> KILLING FISH AND GUTTING THE CLEAN WATER ACT
>
> On April 9, 2002, EPA published proposed Phase II cooling water intake
> regulations for existing power plants (67 Fed. Reg. 17122)
> (www.epa.gov/waterscience/316b). The proposed rule is an abdication of
> Congress's mandate to minimize the environmental damage from cooling
> water intakes. It sets low standards, and then grants the energy
> industry substantial opportunity to raise excuses to avoid the
> standards. The proposal represents a direct and significant threat to
> the nation's aquatic ecosystems, and to the integrity and effectiveness
> of the Clean Water Act and other environmental laws. Comments on EPA's
> proposal are due on July 8, 2002.
>
> Summary of Proposed Phase II Regulation
> · EPA's proposal fails to require closed-cycle cooling (which reduces
> fish kills by approximately 95%) as "best technology" for any of the 550
> large power plants in the country, but instead sets a performance
> standard based loosely on the protection offered by a variety of
> cheaper, less effective, less reliable mechanisms. This weak mandate
> would allow existing plants to kill 20 to 1000 times more fish per
> megawatt than new plants, and continue to decimate aquatic life in U.S.
> waterways indefinitely.
> · The proposal allows power companies to avoid the weak technology
> standard by pleading special economic circumstances, or arguing that the
> local ecosystem does not merit protection. Alternatively, the companies
> may attempt to replace the fish they kill. Such restoration measures are
> vague, unproven, likely to fail, and are rarely if ever intended to
> replace the number or variety of aquatic and marine animals killed by
> the water withdrawals.
> · Instead of setting a protective, technology based standard, the rule
> would adopt and codify many of the site-specific arguments which
> permittees typically use to avoid closed-cycle cooling requirements.
> Since even environmentally sympathetic regulators lack the resources
> needed to rebut, or in most cases fully evaluate these arguments, the
> rule will allow applicants to continue to obstruct and delay needed
> technology upgrades.
>
> Flawed, Biased Cost-Benefit Analysis Trumps the Clean Water Act
> On December 28, 2001, after years of research by its Office of Science
> and Technology, EPA submitted its draft proposal to the White House's
> Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for interagency review. EPA's
> original draft regulation would have required closed-cycle cooling for
> 51 of the largest plants on tidal rivers, estuaries and oceans. This
> compromise proposal fell far short of a closed-cycle requirement on all
> major power plants, but it would have at least minimized the impact on
> the most ecologically productive waterbodies.
>
> However, antiregulatory ideologues in OMB's Office of Information and
> Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) forced EPA to abandon its carefully chosen
> option and remove any closed-cycle requirements. The agencies relied on
> cost-benefit analyses which systematically belittle the value of aquatic
> ecosystems. Even using this drastic underestimate, the calculated
> benefits of the EPA original proposal would have exceeded costs to
> retrofit the most destructive facilities by an ample 3 to 2 margin.
>
> Nevertheless, in direct contravention to the Congressional "best
> technology available" mandate in the Clean Water Act, OIRA rejected any
> use of cooling towers and compelled the least cost alternative. OIRA's
> action also violated Executive Order (E.O. 12866), which prohibits
> regulatory economic analyses from dictating a result contrary to
> statutory requirements.
>
> Background: Fish Kills, Cooling Intake Technology and the Clean Water
> Act
> · Every year, electric generating and industrial plants withdraw more
> than 100 trillion gallons from U.S. waters for cooling, and kill the
> overwhelming majority of organisms in this massive volume by entraining
> them into the facility or impinging them on intake screens. This
> staggering mortality trillions of fish, shellfish, plankton and other
> species at all life stages has stressed and depleted aquatic, coastal
> and marine ecosystems for decades, and has contributed to the collapse
> of some fisheries.
> · A single large power plant can utilize hundreds of millions or even
> billions of gallons of cooling water per day before discharging the
> heated effluent directly into a lake, river or ocean. In contrast, a
> closed-cycle cooling system, which recirculates most of the water after
> dissipating the heat in a cooling tower and is standard technology for
> new plants, cuts withdrawals and fish kills by more than ninety-five
> percent.
> · Section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act requires such facilities to
> employ the "best technology available [BTA] to minimize adverse
> environmental impact." Despite this direct mandate and the decades-old
> availability of cooling towers, industrial pressure and EPA neglect has
> prevented effective regulation. Cooling withdrawals are the only
> NPDES-regulated activity not subject to national categorical standards,
> but instead regulated case-by-case.
> · In 1993, after years of frustration at agency failure to require
> protective technology, a coalition of environmental groups led by
> Riverkeeper sued to force EPA to finally promulgate cooling water intake
> standards, Riverkeeper, Inc. v. Whitman, U.S. District Court, Southern
> District of New York, No. 93-Civ.0314 (AGS). As a result of
> Riverkeeper's lawsuit, on December 18, 2001 EPA promulgated its Phase I
> rule which requires closed-cycle cooling for new facilities (66 Fed.
> Reg. 65256).
>
> Help Stop this Abuse of Our Ecosystems and Environmental Laws
>
> Riverkeeper is mounting a comprehensive legal, technical and policy
> campaign to stop this needless killing of fish and evisceration of the
> Clean Water Act. Please contact us.
>
> Reed Super, Senior Attorney David Gordon, Senior Attorney
> 845-424-4149, ext 224 845-424-4149, ext 225
> rsuper@riverkeeper.org dgordon@riverkeeper.org
--
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