March 27, 2025
Scott Bigleman
Air Regulation and Data Analysis Section
Bureau of Air Quality
South Carolina Department of Environmental Services
2600 Bull St.
Columbia, SC 29201
Electronic Filing via Email to Sc************@****sc.gov
Re: Comments on Proposed Supplement to Air Quality State Implementation Plan for Regional Haze
Dear Mr. Bigleman,
The National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), Sierra Club, and the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks (collectively, Conservation Organizations) submit the following comments on the South Carolina Department of Environmental Service’s (SCDES) Supplement (SIP Supplement)1S.C. Dep’t Env’t Servs., Supplement to Air Quality State Implementation Plan for Regional Haze (Feb. 28, 2025) [hereinafter “SIP Supplement”]. to its Regional Haze Plan for the Second Implementation Period submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on March 3, 2022 (2022 SIP Revision).2 S.C. Dep’t Health & Env’t Control, Final Regional Haze State Implementation Plan for South Carolina Class I Federal Areas (March 3, 2022) [hereinafter “2022 SIP Revision”].
The Conservation Organizations are active nationwide in advocating for strong air quality requirements to protect our national parks and wilderness areas. These groups have long participated in Regional Haze SIP comment periods, rulemakings, and litigation across the country to ensure that states and EPA satisfy their obligations under the Clean Air Act and the Regional Haze Rule (RHR). The Conservations Organizations’ members who live in South Carolina—including NPCA’s over 21,000 members, Sierra Club’s 5,635 members and the Coalition’s 13 current members and many others who have lived and/or worked in South Carolina throughout their careers with the National Park Service—use and enjoy regional Class I areas that are impacted by South Carolina’s sources of haze-forming pollution.
As an initial matter, SCDES fails to include the final revised permits for the International Paper Georgetown Mill, Santee Cooper Cross Plant, and Santee Cooper Winyah Plant in the SIP Supplement. The only documents included in the SIP Supplement containing the permit provisions identified for inclusion in the SIP are all labeled as “draft” permits with no final issuance date.3SIP Supplement at PDF 7, 31, 44. A review of the SCDES website reveals that the State issued final revised permits for each of these facilities on December 31, 20244S.C. Dep’t Env’t Servs., Air Quality Department Decisions (last visited Mar. 10, 2025), https://des.sc.gov/programs/bureau-air-quality/air-quality-department-decisions. The State must include the final revised versions of the facility permits in the SIP Supplement. Moreover, the permit provisions in the SIP Supplement draft documents for the Winyah and Cross plants that SCDES identifies for inclusion in the SIP are significantly different from those provisions in the facilities’ final revised permits issued on December 31, 2024. In the SIP Supplement, SCDES identifies permit conditions B1 through B8 for inclusion in the SIP as measures necessary for reasonable progress in the second implementation period.5SIP Supplement at 3-4. However, the final revised December 31, 2024 permits for Winyah and Cross do not even have a condition B8.6S.C. Dep’t Env’t Servs., Bureau of Air Quality Synthetic Minor Construction Permit, Santee Cooper Cross Generating Station, No. CP-50000034 v.1.0 at 4-7 (issued Dec. 31, 2024) [hereinafter “Final 2024 Cross Permit”], https://des.sc.gov/sites/des/files/Documents/BAQ/DepartmentDecisions/SCCrossRegionalHaze/AIR- Construction%20Permit%20-%20CP-50000034%20v1.0_Regional%20Haze.pdf (including only conditions B1-B7) (attached as Ex. 1); S.C. Dep’t Env’t Servs., Bureau of Air Quality Synthetic Minor Construction Permit, Santee Cooper Winyah Generating Station, No. CP-50000038 v.1.0 at 4-7 (issued Dec. 31, 2024) [hereinafter “Final 2024 Winyah Permit”], https://des.sc.gov/sites/des/files/Documents/BAQ/DepartmentDecisions/SCWinyahRegionalHaze/AIR- Construction%20Permit%20-%20CP-50000038%20v1.0_Regional%20Haze.pdf (same) (attached as Ex. 2). Conditions B2, B5, B6, and B7 in the draft permits included in the SIP Supplement also include different cross references to 40 C.F.R. Part 75 than those included in the same conditions in the December 31, 2024 final permits for Cross and Winyah.7Compare SIP Supplement at PDF 30-33, 48-50, with Final 2024 Cross Permit at 5-7 & Final 2024 Winyah Permit at 5-7. Condition B1 in the draft permits only require Cross and Winyah to submit reports detailing their 30-day rolling average sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions semi-annually,8SIP Supplement at PDF 35, 48. whereas the final December 31, 2024 permits require the facilities to report their 30-day rolling average SO2 emissions on a quarterly basis.9Final 2024 Cross Permit at 5; Final 2024 Winyah Permit at 5. To provide the public with a meaningful opportunity to comment on the SIP Supplement, including the practical enforceability of the permit limits proposed for inclusion in the SIP,1042 U.S.C. § 7491(b)(2) (requiring haze SIPs to include “enforceable emission limitations, compliance schedules, and other measures that are necessary to make reasonable progress”); 40 C.F.R. § 51.308(f)(2)(i) (same); 57 Fed. Reg. 13,498, 13,568 (Apr. 16, 1992) (explaining that states’ SIPs must contain the “legal means for ensuring that sources [comply] with the control measure” and must be “permanent”); see also 89 Fed. Reg. 55,140, 55,154 n.43 (proposed July 3, 2024) (“The EPA also interprets the requirement to be permanent and federally enforceable as being practically enforceable, i.e., an operational or emissions limit with the necessary reporting and recordkeeping requirements such that the source reports compliance with and that can be practically measured and enforced.”). SCDES must provide the final, enforceable version of the relevant permits in the SIP Supplement, identify the correct permit provisions proposed for inclusion in the SIP for the Cross and Winyah Plants, and then re-notice the SIP Supplement for public comment.
Furthermore, SCDES’s proposed SIP Supplement will not result in reasonable progress towards improving visibility at the Class I areas its sources affect. First, SCDES fails to address the issues raised in the Conservation Organization’s previous comments and expert reports submitted to the State on its regional haze SIP. SCDES released its draft SIP Revision for public comment in 2022, at which time the Conservation Organizations submitted extensive comments detailing the significant deficiencies in the State’s source-specific analyses and control determinations, including for the Georgetown Mill, Cross Plant, and Winyah Plant.11Sierra Club, et al., Conservation Organizations’ Comments on South Carolina’s Regional Haze State Implementation Plan at 25-30, 33-34, 43-45 (Jan. 5, 2022) [hereinafter “2022 SIP Revision Comments”] (attached as Ex. 3); SIP Revision Comments, Exhibit 2, Joe Kordzi, A Review of the South Carolina Regional Haze Statement Implementation Plan at 22-28, 38-46, 52-55 (Dec. 2021) [hereinafter “Kordzi Report”] (attached as Ex. 4). In 2024, SCDES released draft revised permits for the Georgetown Mill, Cross Plant, and Winyah Plant, purportedly to incorporate regional haze emission limits identified as necessary for reasonable progress into the facility permits. The Conservation Organizations also submitted comments on those draft permits, again raising errors in the State’s source-specific analyses, as well as issues on the practical enforceability of the limits incorporated in those permits.12Nat’l Parks Conservation Ass’n, et al., Comments on Draft Air Synthetic Minor Construction Permit for International Paper Georgetown – Mill [Air Permit No. CP-50000040 v.1.0] (May 28, 2024) [hereinafter “Georgetown Mill Permit Comments”] (attached as Ex. 5); Nat’l Parks Conservation Ass’n, et al., Comments on Draft Air Synthetic Minor Construction Permit for Santee Cooper Cross Generation Station [Air Permit No. CP- 50000034 v1.0] (May 28, 2024) [hereinafter “Cross Permit Comments”] (attached as Ex. 6); Nat’l Parks Conservation Ass’n, et al., Comments on Draft Air Synthetic Minor Construction Permit for Santee Cooper Winyah Generating Station [Air Permit No. CP-50000038 v1.0] (May 28, 2024) [hereinafter “Winyah Permit Comments”] (attached as Ex. 7). As noted in those prior comments, SCDES inappropriately concluded that the Georgetown Mill, Winyah Plant, and Cross Plant are all “effectively” or “well” controlled by their existing emission limits.132022 SIP Revision Comments at 25-30, 33-34, 43-45; Cross Permit Comments at 2-4; Winyah Permit Comments at 2-4; Georgetown Mill Permit Comments at 4-5. Additionally, SCDES improperly relied on a highly flawed facility-submitted Four-Factor Analysis for the Cross Plant. And as further explained in our comments on the draft permits, the Winyah and Cross permit revisions included illegal exemptions from the relevant haze emission limits during periods of start-up, shutdown, and malfunction.14Cross Permit Comments at 4-5; Winyah Permit Comments at 4-6. Because SCDES still fails to correct any of the significant errors in its analyses, control determinations, and permit provisions for these sources, the Conservation Organizations incorporate by reference and attach our prior comments on both the 2022 SIP Revision and the draft permit revisions for these facilities.
Second, the SIP Supplement makes no mention of SCDES’s proposed permit revision for the Century Aluminum Mt. Holly facility. According to NPCA analysis of 2020 National Emissions Inventory data, Mt. Holly emits 404 tons per year (tpy) of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and 1,734 tpy of SO2, likely contributing to impairment at eight Class I areas in the Southeast region, including South Carolina’s own Cape Romain Wilderness Area.15Nat’l Parks Conservation Ass’n, Regional Haze Interactive Map (last visited Mar. 11, 2025), https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/46dd650b65284b64bf38ccba0e90af8b/?org=npca#data_s=id%3Aa34593c 7926342c58742fabb52465dcf-3d9d38b1e03e45e49e95a88d01d743b5%3A209. In the 2022 SIP Revision, SCDES determined that, among other limits, Mt. Holly’s existing 2.22% monthly average sulfur content limit was necessary to make reasonable progress and proposed to incorporate that limit into the regulatory portion of the SIP.162022 SIP Revision at 166, 187. However, in 2024, SCDES released a draft revised permit for Mt. Holly for public comment that proposed to, among other things, weaken the sulfur content limit to 3%.17Sierra Club, et al., Comments on Draft Construction Permit CP-50000059 v1.0 at 1, 71-74 (June 3, 2024) [hereinafter “Mt. Holly Permit Comments”] (attached as Ex. 8). Nowhere in the draft permit documents did SCDES acknowledge, let alone explain, this discrepancy between the coke sulfur limit proposed in the draft permit and that identified as necessary in the SIP Revision.18Id. at 72-74. SCDES must address its proposal to weaken the sulfur content limit and explain whether it will finalize that change in the permit. If SCDES does plan to weaken the sulfur content limit, then it must conduct a revised Four-Factor Analysis to determine whether the weaker limit would satisfy the requirements of the Clean Air Act and the RHR and re-notice the SIP Supplement to provide the public with a meaningful opportunity to review and comment on the proposed changes to the emissions limits SCDES has determined are necessary to make reasonable progress for Mt. Holly.
In any event, even if SCDES does not ultimately weaken the 2.22% sulfur content limit, the State’s analyses and control determinations for Mt. Holly still would not satisfy its regional haze obligations. As noted in comments on the SIP Revision, the facility-submitted reasonable progress analysis on which the State relied did not comply with the requirements of the Clean Air Act and RHR.192022 SIP Revision Comments at 37-43; see also Mt. Holly Permit Comments at 74-77. The facility-submitted analysis was riddled with errors, causing the State to overestimate the cost of available controls. The State also rejected feasible, available, and cost- effective controls that would achieve needed emission reductions to make reasonable progress in the second regional haze planning period. Because SCDES similarly has not adequately addressed the issues raised in our prior comments, the Conservation Organizations incorporate by reference and attach our prior comments on the Mt. Holly facility.
Third, SCDES must include the Charleston Kraft retirement as a federally enforceable requirement in the regional haze SIP. The Conservation Organizations commend the State for withdrawing Charleston Kraft’s operating permit, requiring a new permitting process for the facility to restart operations. However, SCDES must ensure that retirement is federally and practically enforceable in the SIP. As EPA has explained, where states rely on source shutdowns to make reasonable progress, those shutdowns must be federally enforceable through the SIP.20Memorandum from Peter Tsirigotis, Dir., Env’t Prot. Agency, to Reg’l Air Dirs., Regions 1-10 at 20, 34 (Aug. 20, 2019), https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2021-07/clarifications-regarding-regional-haze-state- implementation-plans-for-the-second-implementation-period.pdf; Memorandum from Peter Tsirigotis, Dir., Env’t Prot. Agency, to Reg’l Air Dirs., Regions 1-10 at 10 (July 8, 2021), https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2019- 08/documents/8-20-2019_-_regional_haze_guidance_final_guidance.pdf; see also 40 C.F.R. pt. 51, App. Y § (IV)D.4.d.2. 4
The Conservation Groups appreciate SCDES’s consideration of these comments. Please do not hesitate to contact us with any questions.
Sincerely,
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Eboni Preston Goddard, Ph.D. Joshua Smith |
Caitlin Miller Philip A. Francis Jr. |