• Skip to Content
  • Skip to Main Navigation
  • Skip to Search

Indiana University Indiana University IU

Open Search
  • Who We Are
    • Leadership
      • Past Leadership
    • Advisory Boards
    • Researchers
      • Affiliates
    • Staff
    • Vision & Mission
    • Careers
  • Who We Work With
    • Businesses and Nonprofits
    • Educators
    • Faculty
      • Research development
    • Local Governments
      • ERI Toolkit
      • Hoosier Resilience Index
      • Resilience Cohort
      • Webinars
      • Beat the Heat
    • Residents
      • Hoosier Resilience Heroes
    • Students
  • Research
    • Projects
    • Publications
  • Tools & Resources
  • News & Events
    • News
    • Events
    • Newsletters
  • Support Our Work
    • Individuals and Families
    • Corporations
    • Foundations
    • Ways to Give
    • Contact
  • Contact

Environmental Resilience Institute

  • Home
  • Who We Are
    • Leadership
    • Advisory Boards
    • Researchers
    • Staff
    • Vision & Mission
    • Careers
  • Who We Work With
    • Businesses and Nonprofits
    • Educators
    • Faculty
    • Local Governments
    • Residents
    • Students
  • Research
    • Projects
    • Publications
  • Tools & Resources
  • News & Events
    • News
    • Events
    • Newsletters
  • Support Our Work
    • Individuals and Families
    • Corporations
    • Foundations
    • Ways to Give
    • Contact
  • Search
  • Contact
  • Home
  • News & Events
  • News
  • Archive
  • 2020
  • EPA to allow some project work without Clean-Air permits

EPA to allow some project work without Clean-Air permits

By: Engineering News-Record

Thursday, April 02, 2020

Decorative - a headshot of Janet McCabe
ERI Director Janet McCabe

Reversing a long-standing interpretation of its own regulations, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued "guidance" to its regional offices and states and seeks public comment on its intent to ease air-pollution permit rules for facility construction under the federal Clean Air Act.

The guidance, sent March 25, would allow work to begin on major projects that would be new stationary air pollution sources—such as power plants, industrial boilers, and manufacturing facilities, or modifications to those—before obtaining preconstruction permits required under the federal law's New Source Review program.

That program is a set of regulations under the law to protect public health and the environment from air pollution when major new air emissions sources are built or modified.

Janet McCabe, former acting assistant administrator for EPA's Office of Air and Radiation during the second Obama administration and now director of Indiana University’s Environmental Resilience Institute, says the new guidance doesn’t consider that “if a company has already sunk a lot of capital into a project, it’s very hard [for a permit authority] to say no to a permit. 

Additionally, once foundations and permanent structures begin to be put in place, technologies available for emissions control may be more limited.

Implementing some of the best available control technologies required under the clean-air law might not be possible on a project already well underway, McCabe says, or they would be more expensive because of the way the structure has been built.

“Your options are much more open” before construction begins, she adds.

Read the full article

Environmental Resilience Institute resources

  • Environmental Resilience Institute Toolkit (ERIT)
  • Hoosier Resilience Index
  • Donate
  • Webinars

Additional links and resources

  • ERI INTRANET
  • GRAND CHALLENGES
Donation button to Give Now to Environmental Resilience Institute
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn

Indiana University

Accessibility | Privacy Notice | Copyright © 2023 The Trustees of Indiana University

  • Who We Are
    • Leadership
      • Past Leadership
    • Advisory Boards
    • Researchers
      • Affiliates
    • Staff
    • Vision & Mission
    • Careers
  • Who We Work With
    • Businesses and Nonprofits
    • Educators
    • Faculty
      • Research development
    • Local Governments
      • ERI Toolkit
      • Hoosier Resilience Index
      • Resilience Cohort
      • Webinars
      • Beat the Heat
    • Residents
      • Hoosier Resilience Heroes
    • Students
  • Research
    • Projects
    • Publications
  • Tools & Resources
  • News & Events
    • News
    • Events
    • Newsletters
  • Support Our Work
    • Individuals and Families
    • Corporations
    • Foundations
    • Ways to Give
    • Contact
  • Contact