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Almost a decade and a half after the federal government established the new air quality parameters, two large areas in Puerto Rico remain without a clear path to comply with the standards, putting at risk the health of hundreds of thousands of people who live or work near major power generation facilities, considered the main sources of polluting emissions in the country.

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Lee este artículo en español.

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The solution to the problem - which could take more than a year to be defined and another four to be implemented - is tied to the substitution of these sources of electricity, a challenge that the country has not been able to face successfully in the past few years and that, clearly, will once again pit proponents of an accelerated transition to renewable energy against proponents of converting power plants to liquefied natural gas, under the premise that this fuel would contribute to achieving compliance with federal standards without limiting electricity supply in the short term.

On Tuesday, almost two years after the Department of Natural and Environmental Resources (DRNA) submitted the State Implementation Plan (SIP) for evaluation, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a “finding of noncompliance, in which it stated that the so-called San Juan area - consisting of parts of the capital, Cataño, Guaynabo, Toa Baja and Bayamón - and the Guayama-Salinas area remain out of attainment of the National Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions set in 2010.

Before becoming a final determination, the finding will be subject to a public comment period for the next two months, which will include two EPA-organized informational sessions scheduled for October 22 and 24 in San Juan and Guayama.

“Non-attainment” notices for both airsheds were originally issued on April 9, 2018, with no corrective plan approved and implemented to date. In November 2022 -after exposing the Puerto Rico government to penalties for delays- DRNA delivered its first version of the SIP, a document that was based on a schedule for retiring generation units that is now obsolete, given the inability to develop new sources of energy production, and will therefore need to be revised over the next year.

According to EPA estimates, using 2010 census data, 275,267 people resided in the San Juan “non-attainment” area, while the Guayama-Salinas watershed covered another 23,401 inhabitants.

For engineer Carl Soderberg, former EPA director in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean, the federal agency will be forced to be much more aggressive in its oversight of environmental compliance, in contrast to the “opportunities” it granted the Puerto Rican government after the “non-attainment” designation in 2018.

“EPA has been extremely condescending, because this all came up in 2010, with the new rules, and in three years all the jurisdictions that weren’t complying were supposed to comply. They were given more time and look where we are. There are certain penalties that EPA can impose, including restricting federal funds for (road) construction and repair,” Soderberg stressed, alluding to one of the penalties the state government came close to facing in 2022, before DRNA submitted the first SIP.

According to the EPA’s findings over the past decade, the most important sources of SO2 emissions are the Palo Seco power plants in Toa Baja, San Juan, in front of the capital’s dock, and Aguirre, in the neighborhood of the same name in Salinas. The SIP that the DRNA delivered in 2022 contemplated that the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) would retire 11 generating units from the Palo Seco and San Juan plants on or before December 31, 2025.

However, of that group, at least four - Palo Seco #3, Palo Seco #4, San Juan #7 and San Juan #9 - are in service or under repair by the current plant manager, GeneraPR, and are unlikely to be decommissioned in the short term due to the fragile state of the generating fleet.

In the case of Aguirre, the 2022 SIP contemplated retiring units #1 and #2 - the plant’s two main plants - at the end of 2025 and 2026, respectively, projections that, in all likelihood, will also have to be adjusted in the review, acknowledged César Rodríguez, DRNA’s interim air quality manager.

“In communication with Genera, we would then be adding the new compliance dates for the withdrawal of units, but that is up to them. The main change, basically, is going to be that,” the official commented in a telephone interview.

The previous schedule was based, essentially, on the retirement schedules of the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) of the electric system approved by the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau (PREB), which so far has not been met due to the absence of replacement generation. The IRP itself is currently under review.

In written statements, GeneraPR emphasized that the retirement will only be possible if the industrial-scale renewable energy projects contemplated in the IRP are executed, but maintained that, “in the short term,” the PREB must give way to modifications and conversions of units to natural gas.

“We understand that PREB could make an expedited decision through an emergency evaluation of the current IRP as required by law and regulation. GeneraPR is prepared to initiate the necessary modifications to operate the entire fleet on natural gas, while progressively integrating renewable energy sources. This option not only ensures compliance with the SIP, but also offers multiple environmental and economic benefits,” said the operator.

Rodríguez acknowledged, for his part, that fuel changes are on the table, although they will have to be balanced against statutory renewable energy targets.

Meanwhile, Salinas environmental lawyer Ruth Santiago rejected that a transition to natural gas is necessary as a prelude to the massive integration of clean sources, labeling that idea as a “20th century argument.

“It is complex, because it has to do with the way PREPA’s hands have been tied, of not being allowed to use disaster recovery and mitigation funds to carry out a distributed renewable energy program (based on rooftop solar panel systems). The PREB and the government have left it to the market, and the market is providing extremely expensive industrial-scale projects,” Santiago stressed.

The five-year term that, statutorily, the central government would have to implement all corrective actions once the determination of non-compliance is final and firm, meanwhile, is also unreasonable for communities that may have been exposed since 2010 to SO2 levels in excess of the current NAAQS.

“It is an environmental injustice and a threat to public health,” she said.

Rodríguez, of the DRNA, insisted that the contamination levels closer to the ground - and to people - are not necessarily as high as at other points within the affected air basins.

“Because of the condition we have as an island and the different winds, (the generatrices consist of) high chimneys that are releasing it into the environment. The environment dilutes a lot and disperses it to high levels in the atmosphere. Of course, we could say that they are contributing to acid rains or harmful effects, but we are not necessarily breathing it,” he said.

In its findings, the EPA stated that, due to deficiencies in the monitoring systems, the DRNA did not provide “complete” air quality results for a period of three consecutive years. Elianeth Rivera Morales, DRNA’s dispersion modeling specialist, noted, however, that the EPA accepted the proposal to base the results on mathematical models based on the emissions data from the generators provided by GeneraPR.

Under the federal Clean Air Act, the DRNA will have 12 months to submit the SIP revision, starting from the time the non-compliance determination announced this week is finalized.

“The part of (how to) get to compliance was accepted in the plan. The mathematical modeling strategy is approved. That is why EPA is going to make a partial approval of the plan,” Rivera Morales commented.

However, Soderberg warned that, in the face of a new non-compliance scenario, the penalties - which in addition to the restrictions on road works could include prohibitions on any project that emits SO2 - could have a substantial economic impact on the non-attainment areas. The engineer recalled that, in the 1980s, the EPA went to Federal Court and “arrested” dozens of used water treatment plants, preventing additional customers from connecting until environmental regulations were met.

“When you get to a time like this, in those areas that there is no compliance, pretty much, it stops economic development,” stressed the member of the Committee of Experts and Advisors on Climate Change.

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This content was translated from Spanish to English using artificial intelligence and was reviewed by an editor before being published.