By Judy Sheahan
August 5, 2002

Charlotte Mayor Patrick McCrory, Chair of the Conference's Environmental Committee, provided a briefing on the status of Clean Air legislation at the Boston Leadership meeting. Senator James Jeffords (VT) has introduced S.556 to amend the Clean Air Act to include older, coal-fired utilities to comply with the Clean Air Act requirements. The White House has also unveiled their Clear Skies Initiative which deals with the same issue and was introduced July 29.

McCrory told the Mayors that a markup of S.556 was held on Thursday, June 27. The bill passed 10-9 with Senator Lincoln Chaffee (RI) joining the Democrats in voting for the bill and Senator Max Baucus (MO) joining the Republicans in voting against the bill. The major source of disagreement was the issue of whether carbon dioxide (CO2) should be included as a regulated emission.

Senators Chaffee and Carper have prepared substitute language for Senator Jeffords bill that would still include CO2 but at less stringent levels, giving the utilities some more time and allow additional flexibility in meeting those standards. It is their hope to reach a bipartisan agreement on their versions.

McCrory suggested for a series of briefings be held to fully vet the issue in order to let Congress know what the Mayors expect with any type of national legislation. At the Madison meeting, a Clean Air and Utilities Resolution was passed that stated that national legislation is needed to would require older power plants to reduce all air emissions at levels strong enough to substantively assist us in our efforts to attain the National Ambient Air Quality Standards.

McCrory said, "Individual states can pass their own legislation, but unless there is national standards, the work of individual states and local governments will not mean very much once the wind blows another state's air pollution into our own backyard."

He also stressed that need that whatever legislation is passed, it needs to allow enough flexibility to maintain reliable energy for our consumers and provide certainty to the electric power sector.