A district judge ordered the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Wednesday to respond to the state of Connecticut’s request to sanction a Pennsylvania coal mine, The Washington Examiner reports.
Connecticut district court Judge Warren Eginton gave the federal government 60 days to decide whether it will sanction the Brunner Island coal power plant in York Haven, Penn., under the Clean Air Act (CAA). Connecticut filed a petition in June 2016 arguing that, as a downwind state, the plant was harming its air quality and hampering its ability to meet ozone regulations.
The petition has sat unanswered for two years.
“[Two years] is clearly at odds the with period of time that Congress deemed appropriate” for the EPA to review a CAA petition, Eginton wrote, according to The Washington Examiner. “Defendants’ proposed schedule contravenes the congressional intent that EPA ‘act quickly on a Section 126(b) petition.’”
Connecticut, Delaware and Maryland have filed similar petitions against coal plants in the northeast. All three states claim relief as downwind states under the CAA, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports.
Connecticut and Delaware have only targeted coal plants in Pennsylvania, but Maryland wants the EPA to sanction dozens of coal plants across five states. No other petitions were addressed in Eginton’s ruling.
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