EPA Drastically Undercounts GHGs For Pulp And Paper Mills - Grandfathered Equipment, "Sustainable" Fuel
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The EPA houses the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, where facilities report their emissions of gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide. But EPA facility totals don’t include what are called biogenic CO2 emissions, or those that come from “natural sources” such as wood, which is a primary fuel for the paper industry.
According to the EIP investigation, the 10 pulp and paper mills that reported the most greenhouse gases in 2023 were able to lower their reported “total” emissions by between 61 and 90 percent each because they burned wood products. Biogenic emission data is buried deeper within EPA data and, when those emissions are included, the largest paper mills can emit as much as a large oil refinery, the report noted.
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EIP also used data from the National Emissions Inventory, an annual estimate of the output of gases like sulfur dioxide, methane, carbon dioxide, and dozens of others. One of the major reasons that pollution levels are so high, Bernhardt explained, is that many paper plants continue using outdated equipment that is far less efficient than modern machinery. The boiler at the Covington mill, for example, is 85 years old. The average age across the 185 facilities that the report found data for was 41 years.
The Clean Air Act effectively grandfathers in the equipment until it comes time to replace it, and the emissions reductions can be stark when that happens. Bernhardt cited the Ahlstrom’s Thilmany Mill in Wisconsin as an example. The plant, built in 1883, replaced its boiler in 2020 and emissions of sulfur dioxide, a health-harming air pollutant, fell from 4,800 tons to 410 tons. A facility in Washington saw an 87 percent drop and one in Georgia plummeted 96 percent.
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https://grist.org/climate-energy/report-finds-paper-mill-emissions-are-wildly-undercounted/
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