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Legislative Forestry Task Force Urges Change To EPA Biomass Emission Standards
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Citing the potential for massive job losses and estimated compliance costs in the billions, forest product industry members serving on the Legislative Forestry Task Force of the Joint Legislative Air and Water Pollution Control and Conservation Committee are urging other Pennsylvania manufacturers to oppose proposed U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations that would impose strict new limits on emissions from industrial, commercial and institutional boilers and process heaters - including biomass fired boilers and heaters. The regulations are known as the Boiler Maximum Achievable Control Technology Rule or Boiler MACT Rule.
"While the forest products industry - a major Pennsylvania employer - would be especially hard hit, the impact of the proposed regulations is not limited to that industry," said Forestry Task Force Chairman Rep. Scott E. Hutchinson (R-Venango).
"As we heard at a recent task force meeting, universities, food product processors, and the chemical, metalworking, auto, plastic and refining industries, to name a few, would share the pain of arbitrary and nearly impossible to meet standards.
"Such actions are the antithesis of what we should be doing in these tough economic times when manufacturing employers are already up against it economically. Reasonable, realistic, science-based standards yes; irresponsible, industry-killing standards, no."
Rep. Hutchinson noted that the EPA is accepting comments on the proposed regulations until August 23. After hearing testimony from several industry members, Penn State University and an environmental consultant, Hutchinson said the Forestry Task Force, at the behest of a majority of its members, would be preparing and offering comments to the EPA seeking changes, and encouraged other industries using such boilers to do the same and do it quickly.
The American Forest and Paper Association has estimated the total capital cost of the EPA proposal to be in excess of $21 billion, and as much as $6 billion to $7 billion over the next two to four years specifically for the forest products industry.
The standards would also require the addition of multiple controls and complex monitoring in many cases.
The National Association of Manufacturers expressed its opposition to the proposal in a letter to the task force.
Rep. Hutchinson said the most common complaints from NAM and affected employers are that the proposed emission limits are unrealistic and virtually impossible to meet, fail to take into account variables in fuels and boiler capabilities or allow for flexible alternative methods of compliance, and will result in unnecessary massive job losses and industry closings.
According to Fred Osman, a professional engineer and owner of Osman Environmental Solutions, an environmental consulting firm, the Boiler MACT regulations are just one of seven regulatory programs EPA has proposed in the past two months that "could have major implications for the use of wood or wood waste in combustion processes."
Carl Webb, plant engineering manager for Wood-Mode, Inc., a Kreamer, Snyder County-based leading national manufacturer of custom cabinetry, told the Forestry Task Force that the cost of control equipment to meet the regulations would cost as much $2 million, while building a new boiler would be at least another $2 million to $2.5 million.
Webb pointed out that just a few years ago, the company had as many as 2,300 employees, but now has approximately 1,200, and consumes half of the hardwoods board feet it consumed two years ago.
Said Webb about the proposed rules, "...if not checked and more reasonable considerations made, compliance for us will be very prohibitive. The cost of compliance for several woodworking industry companies will be too great. More companies will be forced to close their doors or move off shore."
Webb's comments were echoed by representatives of Domtar, which operates an environmental-award winning paper mill in Johnsonburg, Elk County that employs more than 370 people. The company has seen cost estimates of between $10 million to $20 million in controls and modifications to its two boiler units to comply with the proposed rule changes.
Rhett McLaren, an environmental compliance specialist with Penn State University, estimated that changes the university would have to make at its two steam plants would carry life cycle costs of between $450 million and $460 million.
Rep. Hutchinson is also the first cosponsor of House Resolution 879, introduced by Forestry Task Force member Rep. Gary Haluska (D-Cambria) and cosponsored by task force member Rep. Kathy Rapp (R-Forest).
The resolution memorializes EPA to revise the proposed regulations to: "Use a method to set emissions standards that is based on what real-world best performing units can achieve...and that reflects the variability that occurs in real-world, best performing boilers."
The resolution also calls on the EPA to specifically revise its approach for biomass boilers so that the boilers are not penalized because they start with cleaner fuel, and have an emission baseline that is very low compared to other fuels.
According to the AF&PA, the forest products industry has lost 350,000 jobs since the beginning of 2006, and the proposed rules coupled with other EPA proposals in the pipeline could mean the loss of "hundreds of thousands" more forest product jobs.
Rep. Hutchinson questioned the sense of Pennsylvania and the nation offering incentives to develop the biomass industry because it is sustainable, renewable, and a cleaner alternative to traditional fossil fuels, and then decimating a growth industry with unreasonable inflexible emissions limits, so low that they would be virtually unachievable for biomass powered boilers.
"The companies that our Forestry Task Force heard from are responsible citizens who are already meeting or exceeding environmental standards and constantly looking for reasonable ways to economically improve their environmental performance," Rep. Hutchinson stated.
"The Boiler MACT rules as presently constituted are unreasonable, and are part of a tsunami of EPA regulations which will serve only to destroy jobs and close down businesses that are already on the edge."
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8/9/2010 |
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