Last week the EPA released a plan to significantly reduce U.S. carbon dioxide emissions over the next 15 years. It turns out that some of the states faced with making the biggest changes to meet that goal aren’t the ones that rely heavily on the biggest source of emissions—coal power.
In some cases, states that have already planned big emissions reductions are making up for coal-heavy states such as Kentucky and Indiana.
Under the proposed regulations, the EPA set specific requirements for each state to account for regional differences that affect how hard it will be for various states to reduce their emissions. Some of those differences are practical or economic—wind power is more expensive in some places than others, and some states can draw on existing natural gas plants to reduce coal emissions.
But some of the differences are political, says David Victor, director of the Laboratory on International Law and Regulation at the University of California at San Diego. In some states, it’s hard to pass legislation requiring renewable energy, and the EPA took that into account, he says.
Why the EPA Regulations Go Easy on Coal States
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