Preventing Significant Deterioration Under the Clean Air Act : The BACT Requirement and BACT Definition

This Article is the fifth in a series on the Clean Air Act (CAA) Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) program. The first four Articles, which appeared in the December 2005, January 2006, January 2008, and January 2011 issues of the Environmental Law Reporter, focused on baselines, increments and ceilings, on the permit triggers for new facilities, and on area classification and redesignation. This Article examines the requirement that major emitting facilities comply with Best Available Control Technology (BACT) standards for each pollutant subject to regulation under the CAA. This requirement — initially thought to be inconsequential — has now become a dominant feature of the PSD program, for the first time subjecting greenhouse gas emissions from stationary sources to federally mandated pollution control standards