Testimony of Shelley Schneider Air Quality Division Administrator Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality

Good morning. My name is Shelley Schneider (s

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- r). I am the Air Quality Division Administrator for the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality. I am here to today to present testimony on behalf of the Department on the proposed Nebraska Regional Haze and Best Available Retrofit Technology State Impl ementation Plan.
The proposed plan has been available for public comment for more than 30 days. The plan and other related materials have been available for public inspection on the department’s website since November 18 th . The plan was made available to 3 Fede ral Land Management agencies on November 18 th : The United States Forest Service, The National Parks Service, and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. Initial comments were received by those agencies on December 15 th which were discussed on a joint conference call. The initial comments are marked as exhibit 7 . Final comments from the Federal Land management agencies were received on January 14 th and have been marked as exhibits 16 and 17 . Updated comments and supplemental materials were received on January 20 th and marked as exhibit s 19 and 20 . A comment letter from Kent Miller the Manager of the Twin Platte Natural Resources District was received on January 19 th and marked exhibit 18 . And comments from the United States Environmenta l Protection Agency were received this morning on January 2 1 st and marked exhibit 21

. The states of Colorado, South Dakota, Missouri, Minnesota, and Oklahoma were made aware of its availability for their review and comment and the opportunity for the he aring

. As of this morning, no comments were received by any of these state agencies. As discussed in the Executive Summary of the plan, in amendments to the Clean Air Act (CAA) in 1977, Congress set a national goal to restore national parks and wilderness areas , also known as Class I areas to pristine conditions by preventingany future, and remedying any existing man

- made visibility impairment. It wasn’t

until 1 999 that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized the federal Regiona l Haze Rule which may be found at 40 Code of Federal Regulations 51.308 , which aims to fulfill the goals set forth in the CAA by the year 2064. The Regional Haze Rule addresses the combined effects of several pollution sources over large geographic areas. It was therefore necessary to use a regional planning approach to air quality management

. EPA designated five regional planning organizations (RPOs) . T he Central Regional Air Planning Association (CENRAP) was designated as the planning organization represe nting the central portion of the United States. CENRAP is a 9 state/tribal organization that includes the states and tribes from Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas. Since its inception, the State of Nebr aska has been actively involved in CENRAP. The Nebraska Regional Haze Plan incorporates as best it can , the data analyses, modeling results, and technical support documents prepared for CENRAP members by various contractors. In addition, CENRAP has served as a platform for consultation between states, tribes, federal land managers (FLMs), and stakeholders. The Regional Haze Rule applies to all states that contribute to visibility impairment, even those states that do not have Class I areas. Nebraska does not have any Class I areas , but is considered to contribute to visibility impairment at downwind Class I areas located in other states

. The proposed Nebraska plan addresses the minimum requirements under the Regional Haze Rule. In addition, states must require appl ication of Best Available Retrofit Technology (BART) to certain older emission sources that were not previously regulated by the CAA. In July of 2005, EPA published a revised final rule, “Guidelines for BART Determinations under the Regional Haze Rule.” The guidelines outline a presumptive emission rate or percent of control for sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides , for units meeting the criteria , unless the state can demonstrate a different level of control , based on careful consideration of th e statutory five factors. Thefive factors are: cost effectiveness, energy and non

- air environmental impacts,

existing controls at source, remaining useful life of source, and the degree of visibility improvement which may be reasonably anticipated from the technology. Nebraska followed these guidelines in its selection of sources that are subject to BART requirements. We further followed these rules when making determinations on control technology requirements. Nebraska has three subject

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- BART emiss ion units at two facilities

— one the O maha P ublic P ower D istrict Unit #1 located near Nebraska City and the N ebraska P ublic P ower D istrict Units #1 and #2 at Gerald Gentleman Station located near Sutherland, Nebraska. The Department asked OPPD and NPPD to submit BART analyses and BART permit applications. After careful consideration, the Department issued individual BART permits to OPPD and NPPD.
In the case of the OPPD Nebraska Cit y station, the Department determined that the Unit was not subject to presumptive BART levels of control . Nevertheless, the Department NDEQ used the five statutory factors as a guide for making the BART determination. The Department determined that nitrog en oxides control was appropriate, but that sulfur dioxide control was not appropriate, given the level of visibility improvement was not significant enough to warrant such exorbitant cost.
In the case of the NPPD Gerald Gentleman Station, the Department d etermined that presumptive nitrogen oxides control was appropriate. H owever, sulfur dioxide control was not appropriate. This determination was primarily made due to the unique situation surrounding water availability . Contributing factors were cost eff ectiveness and relative degree of visibility improvement

. The Gerald Gentleman station is located in an area of the state that is considered “over

appropriated” with regard to its water resources. This essentially means that the demand of water cannot be sustained by the current availability of water

. A moratorium exists for drilling new consumptive use water wells in the district. This means that no new wells after the moratorium was put into place can be drilled in the district. The Department worked closely with the state Department of Natural Resources and local N atural R esources D istrict to better understand the unique water resource demands and stressors in this particular area of the state. The additional water demand requir ed by scrubbers on the GeraldGentleman station would jeopardize Nebraska’s ability to meet legal

commitments to other states and the Department of Interior agencies of the federal government, as well as meeting the statutory requirements of State Law.
At the time these BART permitting decisions were made, the proposed BART permits were shared with the states of South Dakota, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Missouri. Comments were received from the State of Colorado on the NPPD Gerald Gentleman permit and were addressed in the permit responsiveness summary doc ument. No other comments were received f rom the other states

. Contacts with the states indicated that they were fully aware of the BART decisions and the potential implications of not receiving sulfur dioxide reductions from Nebraska on their regional haze plans. Missouri in dicated their sulfur dioxide issues were more local in nature and from the Ohio River valley. Oklahoma and South Dakota were still in the BART decision making process and regional plan development process themselves. Follow up discussions indicated that Oklahoma would not comment on our proposed plan and that South Dakota was going to account for it in their regional haze plan. This program has a goal of reaching pristine conditions by 2064, there will be many adjustments and changes required along the way. Science will improve. Technology will evolve. Federal and state regulations change and are updated. That is the purpose for requiring mid

- course checks. Those checks would include determining whether neighboring Class I areas are on track or in n eed of further reductions. Those checks would also include an examination of the inventories using the latest modeling techniques to determine whether reductions from Nebraska are critical for those Class I areas. Nebraska is committed to continuing to participate and cooperate in the regional planning process to reduce visibility impairment at Class I areas outside its borders by maintaining an IMPROVE visibility monitoring network and emissions inventory, participating in the consultation process with States and Federal Land Management agencies, and providing periodic progress reports and SIP revisions as required by the Regional Haze Rule. That concludes my testimony.