EPA Won’t Require Carbon Capture at Existing Coal Plants

Existing coal-fired power plants won’t be required to install equipment to capture and store the carbon dioxide they emit under new Environmental Protection Agency rules, the regulator’s top EPA official said.

Gina McCarthy, the agency’s administrator, told a Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington today that EPA will issue guidelines for states that allow the use of energy efficiency, clean-energy installations or demand cuts to reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions. The EPA issued a proposal for new coal-burning power plants on Sept. 20 that would require the expensive capture technology, called CCS.