CRITICS WARN NEW EPA CRITERIA WILL STOP DETECTION OF MERCURY HOT SPOTS

A shift in EPA's criteria for defining mercury "hot spots" in its recent power plant rule is raising concerns among some EPA staff, who say the new approach may fail to detect localized pollution impacts and ignores levels of the contaminants in humans. "They've basically defined the problem away," one EPA source says. Critics have long raised concerns that the Bush administration's cap-and-trade approach to regulating power plants' mercury emissions could create "hot spots" around facilities that purchase emissions credits...