Opinion ID: 187215
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Title IV of the Clean Air Act

Text: Title IV of the CAA, 42 U.S.C. §§ 7651-7651 o, aims to reduce acid rain deposition nationwide and in doing so creates a cap-and-trade program for sulfur dioxide (SO2) emitted by fossil fuel-fired combustion devices. Congress capped SO2 emissions for affected units, or electric generating units (EGUs), at 8.9 million tons nationwide, id. § 7651b(a)(1), and distributed allowances among those units. One allowance is an authorization for an EGU to emit one ton of SO2 in a year. Id. § 7651a(3). Title IV includes detailed provisions for allocating allowances among EGUs based for the most part on their share of total heat input of all Title IV EGUs during a 1985-87 baseline period. Id. §§ 7651a(4), 7651c, 7651d, 7651e, 7651h, 7651i. Whenever an EGU emits one ton of SO2 in a year, it must surrender one allowance to EPA. See id. § 7651b(g). But Title IV also permits EGUs to transfer unused allowances to deficient EGUs throughout the nation or to bank excess allowances and use or sell them in future years. Id. § 7651b(b). Title IV exempts EGUs that are simple combustion turbines, or units which serve a generator with a nameplate capacity of 25 Mwe [megawatt electrical] or less, 42 U.S.C. § 7651a(8), those that are not fossil fuel-fired, id. § 7651a(15), those that do not sell electricity, id. § 7651a(17)(A)(i), and those that cogenerate steam and electricity unless they sell a certain amount of electricity, id. § 7651a(17)(C). It also provides that certain exempt unitsqualifying small power production facilities and qualifying cogeneration facilities, defined in 16 U.S.C. § 796(17)(C), (18)(B) (delegating power to FERC to define the terms), and certain new independent power production facilities, defined in 42 U.S.C. § 7651 o (a)(1)  may elect to become a part of Title IV. 42 U.S.C. § 7651d(g)(6)(A); see id. § 7651i (detailing electing  in provisions).