New Rule Takes Aim at Fish Kills

Environmental groups and attorneys general in six states are suing the Environmental Protection Agency over a new rule that regulates cooling water intake at power plants. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:

Transcript

Environmental groups and attorneys general in six states are suing the Environmental
Protection Agency over a new rule that regulates cooling water intake at power plants.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports.


Power plants take in billions of gallons of water a day from lakes or rivers to keep
their
turbines cool. That process kills fish and other aquatic organisms. The new rule
by the
EPA requires power plants to reduce fish kills by at least 60 percent. But critics
say the
government can easily require a much larger reduction.


Reed Super is an attorney for the environmental group River Keeper. He says a process
called “closed-cycle cooling” can achieve a 95 percent reduction in fish kills. But
he says
power companies don’t want to pay for it.


“Industry gets a good hearing by its representatives in Washington these days, and we
basically have the Office of Management and Budget and the White House and political
appointees at EPA once again caving into industry to give them exactly what they
want.”


Attorneys general of six Northeastern states have also filed suit against the EPA. The
new rule is set to take effect September 7th.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Erin Toner.

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