Dive Brief:

• The Sierra Club is taking the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (DHE) to court over allegedly inadequate emissions controls in a new permit issued for the construction of an 895-MW coal-fired power plant in the state.
• The lawsuit contends that the Kansas DHE has not set emissions limits that meet state and federal standards for carbon, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, mercury, and other pollutants. 
• The suit also alleges the prospective plant's owners, Sunflower Electric Power Corporation, are not using the best available technology to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the plant.

Dive Insight:

The plant could make the state's task of meeting the new EPA carbon emissions reduction goal harder to meet, according to the lawsuit. The EPA wants Kansas to cut carbon emissions by 23% by 2030 compared to 2012 levels. Both Sunflower Electric Power Corporation and the DHE say there are adequate provisions in place to meet state and federal emissions limits. 

The revised permit is the result of a previous Sierra Club lawsuit and subsequent decision by the state's Supreme Court. That suit contended that the original construction permit, issued in 2010, did not impose strict enough emissions standards. The revised permit was supposed to assuage these concerns, but Sierra Club maintains the changes are still not adequate. 

"They’ve just done this very shoddy, slap-dash job,” said Amanda Goodin, attorney for the Sierra Club's legal representation Earthjustice. The DHE "spit out the exact same permit" as before.

The DHE could not comment on the nature of the suit, according to spokeswoman Sara Belfry, but believes the permit's current wording "is in compliance with state and federal law.”