TX118.16 Citizen comment on FR Doc # 2012-15049

The Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) proposed New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) for Greenhouse Gases are designed to deny Americans affordable and reliable coal electricity by forcing power plants to switch from coal to natural gas. The NSPS standard illegally combines natural gas and coal-fired into one "super category" of power plants and requires coal plants to be something that they are not - a natural gas plant. A drastic switch like this threatens the affordability and reliability of domestic energy supplies, since the rules effectively ban new high efficiency coal plants, leaving the nation's households and businesses exposed to less reliable, more expensive, and more volatile electricity sources. What the nation needs is a practical and achievable standard for both coal and natural gas that is in step with a true "all of the above" energy strategy. A practical standard can be achieved by abandoning the proposed greenhouse gas rules and allowing for new and advanced coal-based electricity plants that will be more efficient, economically viable and part of a diverse energy mix. I urge the EPA to withdraw this unnecessary and illegal proposed greenhouse gas rule immediately.