Toxic-fish rule could help Obama hit '20 climate goal

Francois Broquin, a co-author of reports on coal by Bernstein Research, said the combined rules could push as much as 20 percent of U.S. coal-fired electric generation capacity to retire by 2015. “Obviously that will have an impact,” he said.

Frank O'Donnell, the president of the environmental group Clean Air Watch, said that if a large chunk of the coal-fired power fleet went into retirement it could help the country exceed Obama's goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by about 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020.

“We've thought for a long time that proper enforcement of the Clean Air Act, laws already on the books, can have the unintended benefit of really doing something on climate,” he said.

The environmental think tank the World Resources Institute said on Friday that aggressive action on existing federal government rules and state plans could reduce emissions almost as much as Obama wants by 2020. But it said implementation of the looming mercury and other rules could get even closer.

Utilities would likely build plants to burn natural gas, which emits half the carbon that coal does, as the main alternative. Alternative energy like wind and solar power, which provided the most new U.S. electricity capacity last year, could also become more attractive to utilities.

To be sure, the rate of retirements may also depend on the price of natural gas, which is relatively cheap now as new drilling technologies have granted access to vast new supplies.

In addition, coal companies and utilities could sue to stop or delay the rules from being implemented.

But several utilities, including Duke Energy, have already announced plans to shut coal plants.

They know the EPA is also considering rules such as regulating coal ash waste after a dike ruptured in 2008 at a Tennessee Valley Authority coal plant, unleashing a slurry gush that flattened houses. The disaster could take up to US$900 million to clean up.

Additional rules on chemicals that cause smog would add new costs either to comply with or fight in court.

EPA rules alone would not get to the huge reductions of 80 percent of greenhouse gases by 2050 that scientists say are required to stop the world from suffering the worst effects of climate change. Ultimately Congress would have to form a national rule to achieve those cuts.

Until that happens, the EPA rules could serve as a bridge.

“These rules are not going to get all the way (to Obama's 2020 goal) but they are a first and important step,” Bernstein Research's Broquin said.

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