Planning and Modeling Program - BART (Best Available Retrofit Technology)

On April 15, 2004, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed amendments to its July 1999 regional haze rule. These amendments would apply to the provisions of the regional haze rule that require emissions controls known as best available retrofit technology or BART for industrial facilities emitting air pollutants that reduce visibility. These pollutants include fine particulate matter (PM2.5), and compounds which contribute to PM2.5 formation, such as oxides of nitrogen, sulfur dioxides, and certain volatile organic compounds.

The BART requirements of the regional haze rule apply to facilities built between 1962 and 1977 that have the potential to emit more than 250 tons a year of visibility-impairing pollution. Those facilities fall into 26 categories, including utility and industrial boilers, and large industrial plants such as pulp mills, refineries and smelters. Many of these facilities previously have not been subject to federal pollution control requirements for these pollutants.

Under the 1999 regional haze rule, states are required to set periodic goals for improving visibility in the 156 natural areas. As they work to reach these goals, states must develop "implementation plans" that contain enforceable measures and strategies for reducing visibility-impairing pollution. States must develop their implementation plans by January, 2008. States will need to identify the facilities that will have to install BART controls, and must support their decisions in their implementation plans.

The BART requirement directs state air quality agencies to identify whether emissions from sources subject to BART are well controlled, or whether retrofit measures are available to reduce the emissions below current levels. For some of the source categories, existing technology often can reduce emissions by up to 90 to 95 percent. Implementation of this proposal would result in reductions of 2.2 million tons of sulfur dioxide and 1.2 million tons of nitrogen oxides from the power sector by 2015.

The proposed amendments would not set federal emission limits for these plants; states will set those limits as they implement the regional haze rule. Today's amendment also proposes guidelines, known as BART guidelines, for states to use in determining which facilities must install controls and the type of controls they must use.

According to the Clean Air Act, as states conduct BART determinations for individual facilities, they must consider a number of factors, including:

1. the cost of the controls;
   
2. the impact of controls on energy availability or any non-air quality environmental impacts;
   
3. the remaining useful life of the equipment to be controlled;
   any existing pollution controls already in place; and
   
4. the visibility improvement that would result from controlling the emissions.
   

40 CFR Part 51 contains the Regional Haze Regulations and Guidelines for Best Available Retrofit Technology Determinations; Final Rule [PDF]