Cleaner
Air, Better Health, Brighter Future
Passing Clear Skies legislation this year would provide immediate health
benefits – emissions trading under Clear Skies provides incentives for
power plants to reduce emissions early.
Clear Skies is a mandatory program that would dramatically reduce
and cap emissions of sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOX),
and mercury from electric power generation to approximately 70%
below 2000 levels.
Clear Skies would provide health benefits faster, more certainly and at less cost to
America's consumers than would the current Clean Air Act.
Nationwide, Clear Skies would deliver unprecedented emissions reductions
from the power sector without significantly affecting electricity
prices for American consumers. Clear Skies would deliver certainty
and efficiency, achieving environmental protection while supporting
economic growth.
The mandatory emission reductions using Clear Skies' market-based
cap and trade programs build on Clean Air Act programs to facilitate
achievement of human health and environmental goals. Clear Skies
will enable many State and local governments to meet national standards
for fine particles and ozone.
Components of the Clear Skies Act of 2003
The Clear Skies Act:
- Establishes federally enforceable emissions limits (or "caps")
for all three pollutants. Clear Skies' NOx and SO2 requirements
affect all fossil fuel-fired electric generators greater than
25 megawatts (MW) that sell electricity. Mercury requirements
affect only the subset of these units that are coal-fired.
- Uses a dynamic regulatory approach – emission caps and trading
– that provides power plants with flexibility to reduce emissions
in the least costly way.
- Maintains the authority of state and local government to set source-specific
emissions limits for sources within their borders to ensure that
ambient air quality standards are met.
|
Actual
Emissions in 2000 |
Clear
Skies Emissions Caps |
Total
Reduction |
First
Phase of Reductions |
Second Phase of
Reductions |
SO2 |
11.2 million tons |
4.5 million tons in 2010* |
3 million tons in 2018* |
73% |
NOx** |
5.1 million
tons |
2.1 million tons in 2008* |
1.7 million tons in 2018* |
67% |
Mercury |
48 tons |
26 tons in 2010 |
15 tons in 2018* |
69% |
Clear Skies Provides Dramatic Benefits for Public Health
- Clear Skies would begin delivering benefits to human health
and the environment beginning with its passage. Human health benefits
that EPA can quantify grow to approximately $110 billion per year
by 2020, substantially outweighing the annual costs of $6.3 billion.
- EPA projected that, by 2020, the public health benefits from
Clear Skies would include 14,000 avoided premature deaths. An
alternative methodology for calculating health-related benefits
projects over 8,400 premature deaths prevented and $21 billion
in health benefits - still far greater than the costs.
- Americans would also experience approximately 30,000 fewer visits
to the hospital and emergency room and 12.5 million fewer days
with respiratory symptoms (including work loss days and school
absences) each year under Clear Skies by 2020.
- Under Clear Skies, more than 18 million additional people would
be breathing air that meets the national ozone and fine particle
standards in 2020. In the remaining counties, Clear Skies would
achieve additional reductions in fine particles that would further
protect human health.
Clear Skies Makes Great Strides to Help the Environment
- The benefit of improvements in visibility in our national parks
and wilderness areas would total $3 billion per year by 2020 and
this represents only certain regions EPA can quantify.
- Clear Skies would also:
- Reduce nitrogen loads to the Chesapeake Bay and other waters
along the East and Gulf Coasts;
- Help lakes, streams, & forests recover from acid rain damage
(including elimination of chronic acidity in Adirondack region
lakes by 2030); and
- Reduce mercury in the environment.
Clear Skies Simplifies Cumbersome Requirements and Reduces Burdens on States
- Clear Skies would expand and strengthen a proven, mandatory market-based approach and
reduce reliance on complex, less efficient requirements.
- Clear Skies would help state and local governments attain the National Ambient
Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for fine particles (PM2.5) and ozone:
- By 2010, an estimated 42 additional counties would meet the
fine particle standard, and an estimated 3 additional counties
would meet the 8-hour ozone standard.
- By 2020, an estimated 35 additional counties would meet the
fine particle standard, leaving only 8 counties nationwide out
of attainment with the fine particle standard. An additional
3 counties are projected to meet the 8-hour ozone standard.
Clear Skies Maintains Energy Diversity and Security
- Clear Skies would enable continued use of abundant domestic
fuel sources.
- Clear Skies would also benefit energy consumers by enabling
power generators to continue to provide cost effective electricity
for America's energy needs.
Frequently Asked Questions
Clear Skies Act of 2003 Fact
Sheet (PDF 531KB)
Clear Skies Fact Sheet
[En Español] (PDF
37KB)
* The Clear Skies Act
contains "safety valve" provisions for NOx, SO2, and mercury
to limit the marginal costs of removal of each of the three pollutants
if costs exceed a certain threshold. The 2003 modeling, based on
current technological capabilities, shows that the cost of mercury
removal is expected to exceed the safety valve threshold for the
Phase II cap. However, technological improvements could decrease
the cost of mercury control over time and cause prices to remain
below safety valve levels.
** The NOx cap is divided
between two zones with separate trading programs. Zone 1 includes
the 31 eastern states in the continental U.S. and eastern Texas.
The emissions cap for Zone 1 is 1.58 million tons in 2008 and 1.16
million tons in 2018. Zone 2 includes the remaining states participating
in the WRAP process as well as Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and some
of Western Texas. The Zone 2 cap is 538,000 tons in both phases.
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