Mercury Control Options to meet MATS

Mercury control for coal-fired power plants is not a "one size fits all" technology. This article provides some general guidelines when assessing control options to meet the proposed Mercury and Air Toxic Standards (aka Utility MACT). Many plants affected by the Cross States Air Pollution Rule have already invested in both SCRs and scrubbers to meet compliance requirements. For plants firing higher-halogen coals and configured with SCRs and scrubbers, compliance-level mercury removal can often be achieved without adding mercury-specific controls. Although this is good news for these plants, they still may want to consider installing an activated carbon injection (ACI) system as a low-capital-cost backup in order to insure compliance over a range of coal halogen content and operating conditions. ACI is a low capital cost technology that will be a key industry tool to reliably meet mercury emissions control limits. In many cases, ACI can be used as a stand-alone technology for mercury control.