press releases
For Immediate Release: August 3, 2015
Contact: Regina L. Davis, 202-898-9382, rdavis@naruc.org
In response to the Environmental Protection Agency’s release of the Clean Power Plan today, the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) issued the following statement:
The Clean Power Plan has been a focus for our member State utility regulators since it was first proposed two years ago.
State utility regulators take this plan seriously. Now that a final rule has been released, our members will engage in a review process to: understand, with certainty, the revised plan’s requirements; assess how the rules will affect their jurisdictions; engage in meaningful dialogues with their state counterparts, including air regulators and other stakeholder groups on next steps; communicate and coordinate with neighbor states; and assess costs, ratepayer impacts and resources needed for compliance. In many jurisdictions, our members will remain a crucial resource to help determine each State’s implementation plans.
None of these activities can be completed quickly. A plan of this magnitude requires and deserves a deliberative review process. States are not all alike. Therefore, these regulations will affect each state and each region differently.
Moving forward, as we review each aspect of the plan, NARUC will continue to engage in conversations with the relevant agencies and individuals for greater clarity on this highly technical and nuanced set of requirements. To that end, we will help convene key decision-makers, host informational meetings and publish analyses aimed at broader and deeper understanding of the Clean Power Plan.
Although NARUC has taken no position on whether the EPA should establish these rules, we have stated that if the agency does issue rules, it should provide States with maximum flexibility to respond. NARUC also asked the EPA to remove the generic “6 percent at-risk nuclear generation” from the calculation of State-specific emissions targets and to assure that States receive emission credits for all output of new nuclear capacity. The EPA responded to some of these requests.
NARUC will continue to act as a voice for States’ interests and a forum for member information exchanges with federal officials and technical experts.
—Lisa Edgar of Florida, NARUC President
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NARUC is a non-profit organization founded in 1889 whose members include the governmental agencies that are engaged in the regulation of utilities and carriers in the fifty States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. NARUC's member agencies regulate telecommunications, energy, and water utilities. NARUC represents the interests of State public utility commissions before the three branches of the Federal government.
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