Mercury Emissions Standards

The naturally formed metal mercury is released in gaseous form emissions from coal-burning power plants. This air-borne mercury drifts from the mid-west states that have these power plants and is polluting northeastern states. New York and six other states are joining together in the attempt to force the federal government to step in and make some sort of regulations limiting these harmful levels of mercury contamination. From May 2nd to the 4th public hearings on the draft plan will be held in New York.

States have used this avenue before in 2005 in an attempt to have the federal government establish laws on smokestack emissions. In this case the states plan on using provisions of the federal Clean Water Act in their defense because when mercury falls on lakes and streams it has “led to health advisories limiting the consumption of sport fish taken from thousands of lakes, rivers and steams in the Northeast.”

The new commissioner of the NY Department of Environmental Conservation is quoted in the article saying that, “New York and its sister states can gang up on Washington to the force the administration’s hand to move ahead on this.” This brings up the interesting question of, how much influence do these states actually have over the federal government? Are they truly going to be able to pressure them into setting national standards? And if so what will these mid-west states have to say about it. Does the national government have the jurisdiction to set up these regulations? The emissions are crossing state borders, which imply to me that the federal government does have the grounds to set up these regulations and makes me curious as to why they have not already been set up if mercury emissions are so harmful!