State Capitol Highlights
Submitted by Canton1 on
Paxton seeks halt to regional haze rules
Texas Attorney
General Ken Paxton on
March 18 asked an appeals
court to prevent the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency
from implementing new
regional haze regulations until
a trial of the state’s pending
lawsuit challenging the new
rules is heard.
Paxton fi led the 328-page
motion in the New Orleansbased
U.S. Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit.
In February, Paxton fi led
suit, acting on behalf of the
State of Texas and the Texas
Commission on Environmental
Quality, the Public Utility
Commission of Texas and a
list of power-generating companies.
The suit came after
the EPA in January rejected
Texas’ proposed revision to its
state implementation plan for
reducing regional haze.
The EPA rejected the
state’s plan in favor of a federal
plan that Paxton said would
require power generators “to
install costly, unnecessary upgrades
to become compliant.
This could both make electricity
more expensive, and
could result in fewer plants
at a time when Texas needs
more capacity, not less.”
