Advanced Energy Perspectives

This blog post is the second in a two-part series on states' reactions to the EPA's Clean Power Plan. Check out Part 1 here.

To comply or not to comply with EPA’s Clean Power Plan? For states, that is the question. In yesterday’s post, we looked at states that are getting ready to develop compliance plans, even those that are planning to fight the CPP in court. Today, we take a look at the states that are showing no sign of preparing to submit a plan, whether they don’t have to, they haven’t decided how to respond, or they just refuse to — in which case EPA will impose a federal plan.

Photo of the Colorado State Capitol courtesy of Ryan Tolene and used under a Creative Commons License. 

Ever since the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released the final version of the Clean Power Plan (CPP) on August 3, the rule’s 1,560 pages of dense text (and an equally daunting pile of Technical Support Documents) have kept legal analysts and policy wonks busy and bleary-eyed. Perhaps the most important group of readers, however, are state regulators, the officials tasked with producing a state plan for implementation.

Across the country — including in states whose attorneys general are pursuing legal action — regulators are checking where their states stand (see below), asking questions, convening stakeholders, and making plans to comply — or not. In this post, we look at states that are getting ready to develop compliance plans, whether they like the CPP or not. Tomorrow, we will post a look at the states that are showing no sign of preparing to submit a plan, whether they don’t have to, they haven’t decided how to respond, or they just refuse to — in which case EPA will impose a federal plan.

(BAU stands for Business As Usual case, or the reference case.)

On August 3, the U.S. EPA rolled out its final Clean Power Plan regulation for greenhouse gas emissions at existing power plants. Reaction in the states varied, with some new states deciding to sue EPA and others quietly noting they are well positioned to meet their targets. But the response under consideration in North Carolina stands out for being not only self-defeating in its resistance to the EPA rule, but also costly to ratepayers.

Photo by Richard Caperton of Opower, who joined AEE's Malcolm Woolf and Arvin Ganesan in the audience for the announcement. 

The big news came early this week. On Monday, President Obama announced the final version of the Clean Power Plan, the Environmental Protection Agency’s new rule regulating carbon dioxide emissions from power plants under section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. Here at AEE, our experts are poring over the nearly 1,500-page rule, making sure we can help our members make the most of the opportunity for advanced energy growth created by the new regulation. But this week, the media has been writing the first draft of Clean Power Plan history – what the plan is, and what the reaction to it has been thus far.

When EPA releases its much-anticipated final version of the Clean Power Plan (CPP) this summer, regulators and affected industry will shift into high gear as they consider implementation options. While there are many ways to comply, here’s one underlying reality: Given the opportunity, markets will respond. That’s the takeaway from a new report prepared by AEE Institute, based on a review of prior EPA regulations that allowed for market-based compliance. The report predicts that the CPP will spark a robust industry response and unlock a wide array of cost-competitive options – facilitating timely compliance and lowering cost.