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Advocates Press Sen. Collins to Support CO2 Emissions Limits

Patty Wight
/
MPBN

PORTLAND, Maine - Maine environmentalists and some Maine businesses are urging Republican Sen. Susan Collins to support a proposed federal rule that would limit carbon emissions from power plants. The Environmental Protection Agency released its Clean Plower Plan in June and has faced opposition from many congressional Republicans, who say it will cuts jobs and increase energy costs. Collins has not yet taken a position.

If the Clean Power Plan is accepted, it would reduce U.S. carbon pollution 30 percent by the year 2030. Taryn Hallweaver, of Environment Maine, says that's a lot of pollution that would bite the dust. "To put it in perspective, it's the equivalent of eliminating pollution from two-thirds of the cars and trucks in the United States."

The plan is considered by some to be the most significant step the U.S. government has proposed to reduce pollution that causes global warming, not just because of the cuts to carbon emissions, but because, for the first time, it would actually imposes a federal limit, says Dylan Voorhees of the Natural Resources Council of Maine.

"Unlike mercury or smog or soot or sulphur, today there are no limits whatsoever on how much our nation's power plants can spew into the atmosphere," Voorhees says.

Advocates say the EPA's plan would strengthen the RGGI program, or Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. It's a market-based program in the Northeast that caps CO2 emissions. Each state, including Maine, sells emission allowances and uses the proceeds for efficiency programs and renewable energy.

Maine Ocean and Wind Energy Initiative Director Paul Williamson says the Clean Power Plan would further boost Maine's alternative energy market. "Approximately 40 percent of the revenues for those companies comes from projects outside the state of Maine," he says, "so the more we increase those activities from outside the state of Maine, in the Midwest and Southern states, the more opportunities Maine companies have to compete for those projects and bring more dollars back to the state of Maine."

All members of Maine's congressional delegation have publicly supported the Clean Power Plan, except for Republican Sen. Susan Collins. More than 400 Maine businesses have signed a letter urging Collins to support the proposal. Collins says she's evaluating it, but it's still under a public comment period.

"I think we ought to take a look at the comments because there may be some good ideas in there," she says. But Collins says her record is clear: "I have consistently supported the right of the EPA to issue regulations to deal with coal-fired power plants."

Collins has broken rank with Republicans in the past to vote against proposals that would prohibit or limit regulations on greenhouse gases. While Collins has won approval from environmental groups like the League of Conservation Voters and Environmental Defense Fund, others criticize her record as spotty. Dylan Voorhees of the Natural Resources Council of Maine says, as Collins returns to Washington next week, she needs to know where her Maine constituents stand.