VNPA Partners to Reduce Air Pollution Over Voyageurs National Park

The above photographs were taken at the Kabetogama State Forest Vista in Voyageurs National Park, illustrating the vast contrast in air quality and visibility with fluctuations in regional haze. Images courtesy of the Colorado State University, IMPROVE monitoring stations.
 
RELATED UPDATES:
Minnesota Regional Haze Plan Sent to EPA (VNPA, 12/30/09)
Plan to Reduce Minnesota Air Pollution in Limbo (VNPA, 11/11/09)

Minnesota’s Revised Regional Haze State Implementation Plan (SIP), mandated by the federal EPA in order to meet requirements for the Clean Air Act, represents our state’s individual plan to address visibility impairment caused by air pollution in Class I areas (in Minnesota, Voyageurs National Park and the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness), with the goals of achieving natural visibility conditions by 2064.

Voyageurs National Park Association, in collaboration with the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, the Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, and National Parks Conservation Association, has been working with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to ensure that the Regional Haze SIP will result in clean, clear air over Voyageurs National Park and the Boundary Waters Wilderness. The draft plan contains positive steps for reducing harmful emissions, but fails to follow the legally required BART (Best Available Retrofit Technology) analysis that would identify appropriate technologies for attaining the highest emission reductions at eligible power plants in Minnesota. Failing to properly conduct the BART analysis could lead to an inadequate reduction of emissions and decreased visibility in Voyageurs National Park. VNPA and our partners prepared comments for MPCA on September 3, 2009, and will continue to monitor the Regional Haze SIP and other air quality concerns.

READ our petition here: Petition to the U.S. Department of the Interior and Department of Agriculture, submitted on behalf of VNPA and our partners (pdf)

Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) interviewed VNPA Executive Director Cory MacNulty for a feature on our collaborative efforts to clean up the air in northeastern Minnesota. Read and listen to the story here (original air date: August 18, 2009 on MPR’s All Things Considered.)