EPA Power Plant Rule

The 2024 EPA power plant rule poses a significant threat to co-ops’ ability to provide reliable, affordable power, despite the recent repeal of its most onerous requirements.

Threatening Reliable Energy

American families and businesses expect the lights to stay on at a price they can afford. As demand for electricity skyrockets across the nation, the unlawful, unreasonable and unachievable power plant rule puts grid reliability at risk.

In May 2024, the Biden administration’s EPA finalized emissions rules targeting existing coal plants and new natural gas power plants. These rules jeopardized reliability by reducing available electric generation capacity at a time when demand for electricity is drastically rising.

On Sept. 14, 2026, the Trump administration’s EPA finalized a partial repeal of the 2024 power plant gas rule and issued a supplemental proposal to repeal the remaining greenhouse gas limits for power plants.

What Changed

Final rule: EPA repealed key portions of the 2024 rule, including requirements affecting existing coal-fired power plants. This allows electric co-ops to continue operating critical existing generation needed to keep the lights on.
Supplemental proposal: EPA proposed eliminating the remaining greenhouse gas requirements for power plants, including certain Biden-era limits that restrict how often new natural gas plants can operate.
Finish the job: Until EPA finalizes the supplemental proposal, some Biden-era limits on new natural gas plants remain in place. These limits effectively restrict new natural gas plants from operating more than 40% of the time.

Why It Matters

Electricity demand is skyrocketing, and America’s electric grid needs every available electron. The 2024 rule threatened reliability and affordability by forcing critical existing plants toward early retirement and severely limiting the operation of new state-of-the-art natural gas plants. EPA’s 2026 final rule is a major step forward, but full repeal of the Biden-era rule is essential to give electric co-ops the certainty they need to plan and invest in electricity generation.

Electric cooperatives plan to invest nearly $29 billion to bring more than 20 gigawatts of new natural gas generation online, enough to power 17 million American homes. Those investments can deliver their full reliability benefit only if the plants are allowed to operate as needed.

Where We Stand

NRECA welcomes EPA’s partial repeal and urges the agency to finish the job by quickly finalizing its proposal to eliminate the remaining restrictions on new natural gas plants. NRECA has long maintained that the 2024 rule is unlawful, unrealistic and unachievable and that it poses a serious threat to electric reliability and affordability.

Header Photo: Brad McLaughlin/Getty Images