PORTLAND – Maine, which has taken steps to curb most homegrown mercury pollution, is lining up in support of proposed national standards that would regulate mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants.

Gov. John Baldacci and Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins have urged the Environmental Protection Agency to stand firm on a December 2007 compliance date for the new standards.

The EPA has until Dec. 15 to issue the proposed standards.

Maine has reduced its mercury pollution by a series of steps that range from the shutdown of the Holtrachem chlor-alkali plant in Orrington to controls on incinerators and the removal of mercury thermometers, mercury switches in cars, and other mercury-containing products from the waste stream.

“From our point of view, the technology is out there to control these things,” said David Wright, an air toxics specialist in the state Bureau of Air Quality. “EPA has done the right thing and put controls on medical waste incinerators and hazardous waste incinerators and solid waste incinerators, and it’s simply time to do the right thing with the largest source that they’ve identified, and that’s the coal-fired utilities.”

The Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management, a regional association of air quality agencies, released a report last month saying that mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants could be cut by more than 90 percent with regulation and existing mercury-control technologies.

Industry groups say that goal is unrealistic, especially with a deadline of 2007. The technology isn’t ready, says Dan Riedinger, a spokesman for the Edison Electric Institute, and keeping to the 2007 timetable will only close power plants and raise the price of electricity.

Mercury contamination can have serious neurological, developmental and behavioral effects in both people and wildlife.