EPA Tussles with Industry over Hazy Western Skies

On my adventures around the Black Hills, I keep noticing that the grand vistas seem a little hazy. Bear Butte, the vast plains around us... they should be a little clearer, shouldn't they?

Yes, they should, but western coal plants are messing up the view:

Visibility has been reduced by one-half to two-thirds what it would be under natural conditions at national parks and forests in the western United States because of haze-forming particulate matter such as nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide, federal officials say. At Theodore Roosevelt National Park, in western North Dakota, the National Park Service says visibility can be reduced from 120 miles in clear conditions to as little as 40 miles [Drew Kerr, "North Dakota Spars with EPA over Park Pollution Rules," Midwest Energy News, 2011.10.25].

The Environmental Protection Agency created the Regional Haze Program in 1999 to improve visibility in 156 national parks and wilderness areas, including the Badlands and Wind Cave National Park here in South Dakota. Coal backers say no way. They say air quality on the Great Plains is good enough and that retrofitting existing coal plants with modern emissions controls would cost too much.

The South Dakota Board of Minerals and Environment has approved rules to implement the EPA's Regional Haze Program. These rules will require upgrades at the Big Stone power plant in northeast South Dakota, upgrades its owners say may cost more than $100 million.

So I'm curious: Rep. Kristi Noem portrays the pine beetle as an imminent threat to the Black Hills tourism industry. She advocates lifting restrictions on industry activity (logging) as a solution. Coal emissions threaten clean air, which is also important to South Dakota tourism. Will we hear her supporting the logical regulatory solution for this threat when it means raising industry's cost of doing business?

p.s.: Rep. Noem's good friend Pete Lien need not worry about the Regional Haze Program: SDBME's review finds "the air emissions from Pete Lien and Sons's lime kiln does not reasonably contribute to visibility impairment in the Badlands and Wind Cave National Parks."