NRDC obtained a leaked copy of the final rule, which essentially repeals the "new source review" provision of the Clean Air Act. That provision requires industrial facilities to install modern pollution controls when they make upgrades to plants that increase air pollution. The new final rule would allow facilities to avoid installing pollution controls when they replace equipment -- even if the upgrade increases pollution -- as long as the cost of the replacement did not exceed 20 percent of the cost of what the EPA broadly defines as a "process unit." For example, if a coal-fired power plant replaced a boiler whose cost was less than 20 percent of the replacement cost of the entire process unit -- the boiler, turbine, generator and other equipment that turns coal into electricity -- the company would not have to control the resulting pollution increases. See National Resource Defense Council's Press Release.

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