The US Environmental Protection Agency has issued tough new rules: gas-fired power plants face many green barriers

The EPA sets greenhouse gas standards and guidelines for power plants. The final rule was announced the same day as three other EPA regulations focused on fossil fuel power generation. The four new rules convey the Biden administration's goal of blocking future fossil fuel-based power generation planning. For new gas plants, because the government is just trying to downgrade them, Not full repeal: New base-load natural gas power plants (i.e. those with a capacity factor greater than 40 percent) must meet detailed pollution source performance standard requirements based on " efficient " combined cycle combustion technology immediately after start-up, and have carbon capture and storage systems installed by January 1, 2032. Like the requirements for coal plants, carbon capture and storage devices must capture 90 percent of all carbon dioxide emissions. The inevitable result of this capacity coefficient cut-off point is that it greatly reduces the possibility of building new basic load natural gas power plants. For intermediate-load natural gas power plants with a capacity factor of between 20 and 40 percent, although there is no carbon capture and storage requirement, But they will need to use efficient simple cycle gas turbine technology. For a simple cycle gas turbine, higher efficiency can be achieved by increasing the combustion temperature, increasing the pressure ratio and using intermediate cooling of the compressor. With these improvements, the EPA states that simple cycle gas turbines can be designed to be 33 to 40 percent more efficient. Finally, for low-load or " peak-shaving " natural gas power plants (i.e. those with a capacity factor of less than 20 %), Greenhouse gas mandated requirements are further reduced, with no carbon capture and storage or efficiency improvements required. However, these peaking plants still have to meet new pollution source performance standard emission thresholds based on optimal system emission reductions " using low-emission fuels, " This mainly includes natural gas and a small amount of distillate (i.e. fuel oils No. 1 and No. 2).