The compromise announced Wednesday on FPL’s Wyman Station was an important example of the state putting reasonable standards ahead of strict controls. Like all compromises, it demanded that both sides – in this case, FPL and the environmental group the Natural Resources Council of Maine – give up something and cooperate to reach agreement. That they were able to do so after so many months of disagreement speaks well of both parties.

At issue were the nitrogen oxides emission levels from FPL’s Wyman power station in Yarmouth. Reductions were planned to be fully in place by 2005, but without agreement on the method for achieving the cuts, the interim date for reductions, June 2003, was in jeopardy. FPL wanted its reductions to come 80 percent at the plant itself and 20 percent from trading – that is, paying for pollution credits from plants that were below the regulated level. The NRCM wanted all the cuts to come from Wyman to meet the standard of .15 parts per million Btu. The Department of Environmental Protection and the Board of Environmental Protection could see the benefits of both sides.

The difference for FPL was cost – about $40 million in added expense to get below the .15 standard and ensure Wyman stayed below it. The compromise, led by the DEP’s Jim Brooks, gave FPL more flexibility around the standard, especially as it affects its two older and much smaller power units. The change allows FPL to use much less expensive technology and keep its plant permitted even if the combined result of all four of its units on occasion slightly exceeds the standard. In exchange, FPL gave up the ability to trade, a standard practice elsewhere in the region and one the NRCM supported on another pollution issue just a few years ago.

The agreement means a reduction of 800 to 1,200 tons of nitrogen oxides annually downwind of the plant and means that it will continue producing power, which it may not have if it were forced to adopt the more expensive technology. At least as important, however, was the ability of these opposed groups to come together and look not merely at the strictest interpretation of the standard, but to find a way to meet the intention of the rule, which was significant cuts in pollution. All sides deserve credit for finding a successful conclusion.