by Stacy Morford -
Feb 12th, 2009 
While other states are backing away from coal power, the Kansas Legislature seems dead set to clear the way for Sunflower Electric to build two huge, coal-fired power plants on the state's western plains.
To get those power plants – and the 11 million tons of CO2 they'll produce each year – lawmakers will first have to circumvent Kansas Health and Environment Secretary Rod Bremby. They tried three times last year and were slapped down by the governor's vetoes. Now they're trying again, and they might have the votes this time to succeed.
Bremby made history a year and a half ago when he became the first state official to refuse to issue an air permit based, not on sulfur or mercury emissions, but on the potential danger posed by CO2.
In denying Sunflower's request for the air permit, Bremby wrote:
It would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing.
To get around Bremby, coal-supporters in the Kansas Legislature are going after the secretary's very authority to regulate power plant emissions. The House Energy and Utilities Committee could vote as early as today on a bill that would prevent the Health and Environment secretary from regulating any power plant pollutants that are not regulated by the federal government.
CO2 is not on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s list, at least not yet.
The EPA has the authority to regulate CO2 under the Clean Air Act, it just needs to make the move. As Kansas Sierra Club legislative director Tom Thompson told us:
Everybody’s saying, ‘Damn it, why doesn’t the president and EPA issues some carbon regulations and rules?’
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