in effect
Proclamation 10956, signed July 17, 2025, is a presidential action that grants a 2-year compliance exemption to certain coal- and oil-fired power plants under the Clean Air Act. It invokes Section 112(i)(4) of the Clean Air Act, which allows the President to exempt stationary sources from hazardous air pollutant rules on national security grounds or when required technology is unavailable.
A 2024 EPA rule (89 FR 38508) tightened the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for coal- and oil-fired power plants, with a compliance deadline of July 8, 2027. This proclamation pushes that deadline back by two years, to July 8, 2029, for the specific facilities listed in Annex I of the document. During that window (July 8, 2027 through July 8, 2029), the listed plants are held only to the older, less stringent MATS standards that were in place before the 2024 rule took effect. The President’s stated bases for the exemption are that the emissions-control technology required by the 2024 rule does not yet exist in commercially viable form, and that maintaining coal generation capacity is a national security interest.
Coal- and oil-fired electric power plants specifically named in Annex I of the proclamation receive direct relief — they face no obligation to meet the stricter 2024 emission limits until at least July 2029. Communities near those facilities, utilities that rely on them for grid capacity, and workers employed at those plants are all indirectly affected by whether and how long those plants remain in operation.