Four major regional grid operators are getting involved in a courtroom battle over EPA’s latest rule aimed at controlling planet-warming pollution from the power sector.
Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) led a new joint “friend of the court” brief Friday urging the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to send the agency back to work on certain requirements under its rule setting limits on carbon emissions from existing coal- and new gas-fired power plants.
If compliance deadlines and other provisions aren’t modified, the EPA rule is “destined to trigger an acceleration in the pace of premature retirements” of power plants needed to support “ever-increasing” demand for electricity, MISO said in the brief.
“Such inevitable and foreseeable premature retirement decisions resulting from the Rule’s timelines will substantially strain each of the [grid operators’] ability to maintain the reliability of the electric power grid to meet the needs of the citizenry and the country’s economy,” the brief continued.
