Two energy companies in Montana want the Supreme Court to block the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from enforcing new mercury emissions and toxic metals standards, citing concerns over what they say is the high-cost burden associated with the rules.
At the time, the EPA said the final rules would help achieve “important hazardous air pollutant (HAP) emissions reductions” while improving public health for Americans and reducing adverse environmental impacts.
However, in their filing with the court, Talen Montana and NorthWestern Energy argue the EPA’s final rule “imposes enormous costs without any meaningful benefits, and therefore seeks to drive down emissions without any statutory basis.”
Talen operates the Colstrip power plant, the largest coal-fired power plant west of the Mississippi River, which supplies power throughout Montana and the Pacific Northwest.
The power plant “is critical to maintaining the stability of the electrical grid in Montana” and provides approximately 3,000 jobs, $200 million in disposable, after-tax income, and over a billion dollars in economic output, according to the Supreme Court filing.
In the petition, the utility firms said that while the EPA’s rule will have “broad industry-wide impacts,” the Colstrip Power Plant in Montana is “uniquely impacted.”
“Almost half of the Final Rule’s regulatory costs are imposed on Colstrip, even though EPA failed to show that additional emission reductions are necessary to achieve any measurable health benefits,” the filing stated. “Indeed, EPA has determined that there is no meaningful risk from Colstrip’s current emissions, meaning that any ‘public health’ benefits from additional reductions amount to statistical noise.”
‘High Risk of Colstrip Prematurely Retiring’
To meet the EPA’s emission limit under the new regulations by mid-2027, Colstrip would need to add additional emissions control technology—in the form of a new baghouse—on top of its already dedicated control technology, at an estimated cost of $350 million, the filing states. A baghouse is a large filter that removes particulates from gases emitted by power plants.“Because the finalized rules force Colstrip to incur a $350 million expense with at most four and a half years for the plant to recover those costs by selling power, the capital costs of controls are economically irrational for the facility (over and above the inherent irrationality of the Final Rule),” the utility giants said.
“This poses a high risk of Colstrip prematurely retiring before the 2027 compliance deadline of the Final Rule to avoid the expenditures,” they continued.
If the Colstrip power plant closed prematurely, it would bring “devastating effects on grid reliability and its ability to meet load” for NorthWestern and impact its ability to meet demands.
In April, the EPA said the finalized mercury emissions regulations would reduce emissions of mercury and non-mercury metal hazardous air pollutants, such as nickel, arsenic, and lead.
The agency said this, in turn, would reduce the health risks associated with living close to active and inactive coal-burning power plants, such as fatal heart attacks, cancer, and developmental delays in children.
However, Talen told the court that the current cancer risk from the Colstrip plant is 0.147- in-1 million, which is almost seven times lower than the 1-in-1 million risk threshold that the EPA itself has determined.
“Reducing cancer risk that is already less than 1-in-1-million or non-cancer hazard indices already less than 1 yields negligible public health benefits, if any,” Talen Montana and NorthWestern Energy wrote in the filing with the court.
A spokesperson for the Environmental Protection Agency declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
