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EPA Says Billings Now Meeting Air Pollution Standards

First time EPA has re-designated a polluted area as making sufficient air quality improvements

By Dillon Tabish

BILLINGS — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is reversing a 2013 finding that Montana’s largest city was out of compliance with air pollution standards, saying that the closure of a coal-burning power plant has eased the problem.

The closure of the 153-megawatt Corette plant reduced emissions of sulfur dioxide to levels low enough to protect public health in Billings as required under the Clean Air Act, the EPA said.

High levels of sulfur dioxide can impair breathing and cause other health problems. Children, the elderly and people with respiratory problems are most susceptible.

It’s the first time the EPA has re-designated a polluted area as making sufficient air quality improvements to meet federal sulfur dioxide standards since 29 communities across the U.S. were ruled out of compliance.

Montana officials said they had prevailed in their efforts to convince the EPA that it was using flawed data. Gov. Steve Bullocks said the Billings area met the federal air quality standards even before Corette closed.

But the EPA said Corette was the “key contributor” to the pollution problem. It was the sole reason cited for the agency’s reversal of its 2013 finding, in a ruling signed by EPA Regional Administrator Shaun McGrath on April 4.

Bullock said Tuesday the EPA’s move would ease restrictions that hampered industrial expansion in Billings.

“My administration stood up to them,” the Democratic governor said. “We successfully removed an unnecessary burden on growth.”

The change in the state’s non-compliance designation is expected to go into effect in June. The EPA had a 2018 deadline for the state to control emissions, EPA spokesman Rich Mylott said.

State environmental regulators said they plan next to shift their focus to about 15 communities across the state that the EPA has said remain out of compliance with air quality rules.

Those areas, too, have been wrongly judged by the EPA to have too much pollution, said Tom Livers, director of the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. But making that case could prove a tougher than in Billings, where the power plant closure had such a large effect.

Corette emitted thousands of tons of sulfur dioxide annually for decades. In 2010 the EPA tightened sulfur dioxide pollution standards and began tracking the amount of pollution emitted on an hourly basis.

The power plant shut down in March 2015. The move came in part because of the high cost of installing equipment that would have been needed to meet tightening federal standards for pollutants including mercury and sulfur dioxide.

If the EPA designation had remained in place, other industrial plants could have been forced to add pollution controls. The Clean Air Act also allows the government to sanction non-compliant states by withholding federal highway funds.

Most sulfur dioxide comes from burning fossil fuels. Even short term exposure — as little as five minutes out of every 24 hours — can cause difficulty breathing and exacerbate asthma, said Yellowstone County Health Officer John Felton.

Other major sources in and around Billings include oil refineries operated by ExxonMobil, Phillips 66 and CHS, the Yellowstone Energy Limited Partnership (YELP) power plant and the Montana Sulphur and Chemical Company.

Most of those facilities showed decreases in sulfur dioxide emissions in recent years, according to data from the Montana Department of Environmental Quality. All sources combined in the Billings area emitted 4,661 tons of sulfur dioxide in 2015 versus 7,345 tons in 2011. That’s a 36 percent drop.