In a bid to clean up one of the nation's dirtiest coal-fired power plants without causing economic harm to the Navajo Nation that surrounds it, the Environmental Protection Agency indicated on Friday that it would give the plant's owners five extra years, until 2023, to install expensive state-of-the art emissions reduction equipment.
The agency expressed its willingness to extend the deadline by releasing a proposed rule.
The Navajo Generating Station near Page, Ariz., not far from the Grand Canyon, has long been a priority for environmentalists concerned about the health impacts from the pollution it generates and the ensuing haze that settles over the the majestic park.
But the 2,200-megawatt plant has powerful defenders. Its electricity has helped light Los Angeles and pump Colorado River water to communities around Arizona. The plant, which first generated electricity 39 years ago, and the Kayenta coal mine that feeds it provide about 1,000 local jobs. The vast majority of these are held by Native Americans. Unemployment rates are well above 50 percent in and around the reservation.
Jared Blumenfeld, the E.P.A.'s regional administrator for California, Nevada and parts of Arizona, said the economic issue was a major reason for the extension. "There's an economic reality and imperative here," he said in an interview. "I am committed to ensuring that we were not the reason the facility closes," he said. "I wanted it to remain open while the tribes develop a plan for a more sustainable future."
Yet the essential goal, he added, is to enforce the Congressional mandate to reduce the haze the obscures the view in national parks like Grand Canyon.
The managers of the Salt River Project, the private utility that manages the plant, said they were uncertain what the implications of the proposal would be. Even investing as much as $1 billion in control equipment, and extending the deadlines, might not solve the problem, they said.
"We appreciate that the E.P.A. appears to have attempted to take into consideration the complex timing issues that this decision creates for the N.G.S. owners," John Sullivan, the chief resources executive at the project, said in a statement. "Unfortunately, the proposal may not allow the owners enough time to resolve uncertainties facing the plant before they will be required to make a significant financial commitment."
The E.P.A. proposal makes it clear that the agency will accept only one technology to clean up the emissions of nitrogen oxides. These chemicals are a key component in the formation of fine particles, which are associated with both haze and heart and lung disease. But it also gave the plant credit for its installation of so-called low-NOx burners several years ago; these credits were part of the formula for extending the deadline for installation of the new equipment.
The technology the agency is requiring, known as selective catalytic reduction, transforms some of the smokestack gases into a harmless blend of pure nitrogen and water vapor. Installing these control systems on the three units of the Navajo generating station could cost $550 million to $1.1 billion, according to an estimate published by the Central Arizona project, which distributes the Colorado River water.
The conciliatory proposal, on which the public can submit comments for the next 90 days, drew mixed responses from the longtime combatants in the battle over the plant's emissions.
Erny Zah, a spokesman for the Navajo Nation, said the proposal's insistence on this technology was disappointing. "But it seems that the E.P.A. did have in mind our concerns about the economic impact that harsh deadlines could do to this plant, and the mine, and northern Arizona as a whole," he said.
Andy Bessler of the Sierra Club praised the E.P.A. proposal. "We applaud the Environmental Protection Agency for requiring the long-overdue cleanup of pollution from this dirty coal plant, which for decades has harmed human health and marred one of the nation's iconic national parks, the Grand Canyon," he said.
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