Submit Comments on EPA's Power Plant Cooling Water Ruling to Help Protect America's Rivers

Updated: 7/20/2011
Thermoelectric power plants account for approximately 53% of all fresh surface-water withdrawals in the United States - sucking up approximately 136 billion gallons of freshwater each day and killing billions of fish and other river species annually in the process.

EPA recently proposed a new ruling on power plant cooling water intake that falls staggeringly short of properly regulating outdated and inefficient technologies. Help protect America's waterways by submitting comments to on this proposed ruling, urging the EPA to implement a stronger cooling water ruling that eliminates the use of all inefficient and destructive once-through technology. The deadline for public comment on the ruling is August 18th.

Contributing significantly to these frightenlingly unsustainable national water withdrawal rates are the hundreds of outdated power plants across the country using antiquated once-through cooling systems. These systems slurp up massive amounts of water without recycling it and kill billions of fish species annually in the process. On average, coal fired power plants using once-through cooling technologies use approximately 28,000 gallons of water per megaWatt hour of electricity produced, while plants using closed-loop or recirculating-wet cooling technologies use closer to 3,500 gallons of water per megaWatt hour produced. By upgrading all older thermoelectric power plants that still use once-through technologies with closed-loop systems, the US can cut national water withdrawals for electricity production by a massive amount as well as protect billions of fish species each year.

Photo courtesy of wigwam jones under Flickr's creative commons licensing.

Section 316(b) of the 1972 Federal Clean Water Act requires all power plants to use the 'best technology available' to minimize the adverse environmental impacts of cooling water intake structures. And, in 2001, the EPA issued national regulation identifying closed-cycle cooling as the best available technology for newer power plants.

Unfortunately, there are still hundreds of older plants across the US that sill employ outdated cooling technologies. The Environmental Protection Agency is not doing an adequate job of protecting our national waters by taking a strong enough stance to ensure the best available, most efficient water withdrawal technologies are employed across the energy sector.

Click here to read a fact sheet for EPA's proposed cooling tower ruling.
Click here to read the entire proposed EPA ruling in the Federal Register.

Get your voice heard on this crucial issue by submitting a comment on this proposed ruling, urging her and the EPA to take a stronger stance against the national threat thermoelectric power plants pose to our freshwater supplies by eliminating the use of all once-through cooling systems.

Comments may be submitted the following ways:

Online:
Here
(recommended method)

By E-mail, to:
OW-Docket@epa.gov
(with the subject 'Attention Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OW-2008-0667')

By mail, to:
Water Docket, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
4203M, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW Washington, DC 20460
Attention Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OW-2008-0667

(If commenting by mail, you must include a total of 3 copies, as well as mail a copy of your comment to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to Desk Officer for EPA, 725 17th st. NW, WAshington, DC 20503.) - Talk about jumping through hoops...

Or, by hand, to:
EPA Docket Center, EPA West Building Room 3334, 1301 Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, DC

But wait! There's more you can do on this issue to help protect America's water! River Network has launched a national Campaign to Sustain Water and Energy and we would love for you to join us in this important initiative! To become a part of this campaign, please take a quick survey about how climate change is currently affecting your watershed, how you or your organization are working to mitigate these effects, and how River Network and our campaign members can work to help you in your efforts. Read the full campaign strategy here.

Overly water consumptive practices should be a thing of the past, especially in our nation's most massive industry - electricity production. Please join River Network, the Natural Resources Defense Council and other leading environmental advocates across the nation in efforts to conserve freshwater resources and fish species by curbs the use of once-through cooling technologies. Submit comments to EPA's proposed ruling before August 18, and join the Campaign to Sustain Water and Energy!

Action alert template generously supplied by Steve Fleischli, Senior Attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council