Testimony of Shelley Schneider

Air Quality Division Administrator

Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality

Good morning. My name is Shelley Schneider (s-h-e-l-l-e-y s-c-h-n-e-i-d-e-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 Implementation 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 18th. The plan was made available to 3 

Federal Land Management agencies on November 18th: 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 15th

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 14th and have been marked as exhibits 16 and 17. Updated 

comments and supplemental materials were received on January 20th and marked 

as exhibits 19 and 20. A comment letter from Kent Miller the Manager of the

Twin Platte Natural Resources District was received on January 19th and marked 

exhibit 18. And comments from the United States Environmental Protection 

Agency were received this morning on January 21

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 hearing. 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 preventing 
any future, and remedying any existing man-made visibility impairment. It wasn’t 

until 1999 that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized the 

federal Regional 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). The Central Regional 

Air Planning Association (CENRAP) was designated as the planning organization 

representing 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 Nebraska 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 application 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 the statutory five factors. The 
five 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-to-BART emission units at two facilities—one the 

Omaha Public Power District Unit #1 located near Nebraska City and the Nebraska 

Public Power District 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 City 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 nitrogen 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 determined 

that presumptive nitrogen oxides control was appropriate. However, sulfur 

dioxide control was not appropriate. This determination was primarily made due 

to the unique situation surrounding water availability. Contributing factors were 

cost effectiveness and relative degree of visibility improvement. The Gerald 

Gentleman station is located in an area of the state that is considered “overappropriated” 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 Natural Resources District to better understand 

the unique water resource demands and stressors in this particular area of the 

state. The additional water demand required by scrubbers on the Gerald 
Gentleman 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 document. No other comments were received from 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 indicated 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 need 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.