Who are the top climate polluters in the country?

A large share of the climate pollution produced in the United States comes from just a handful of big polluting facilities – the vast majority of them electric power plants. With the Biden administration recently announcing the final rules on reducing pollution from power plants, how big of a difference will it make to get the dirtiest polluters to clean up their act? According to data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the answer is: a lot.

In 2022, the 50 highest-emitting U.S. facilities released 471.8 million metric tons of greenhouse gases (GHGs, carbon dioxide-equivalent). Those 50 facilities were responsible for nearly 7% of the U.S.’s total GHG emissions in 2022. 

Which power plants are worst for the climate?

• Ninety percent of the top 50 polluters are power plants that burn coal and/or gas. Together, those 45 power plants emitted 27% of all greenhouse gases from electricity generation nationwide.
• The number one greenhouse gas polluter in the country – the James H. Miller Jr. power plant in Quinton, Ala. –  released more than 21 million metric tons of GHGs in 2022. That’s more climate pollution than the entire state of Hawaii produced in 2021.
• The nine power plants among the nation’s top 10 polluters released nearly 126 million metric tons of GHGs in 2022. That’s more from just nine facilities than 33 individual states – including Wisconsin, Colorado and Virginia – each released in 2021.

Which industrial polluters contribute most to climate change? 

Power plants aren’t the only industrial facilities producing large volumes of climate pollution. The ExxonMobil refinery in Baytown, Texas, for example, produced 12.6 million metric tons of GHGs (carbon dioxide equivalent) in 2022, sixth-most in the nation, and equal to annual emissions produced by 3 million of today’s typical passenger cars. 

Four other non-power plant facilities are among the nation’s top 50 emitters: two steel mills (the U.S. Steel facility in Gary, Ind., and the Cleveland-Cliffs facility in Burns Harbor, Ind.), the CF Industries Nitrogen LLC nitrogen fertilizer plant in Donaldsonville, La., and the Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas City, Texas.

What changed from 2021?

Some facilities saw significant decreases in total emissions and rankings from 2021. Notable examples include:

• Ascend Performance Materials (Fla.): Pollution fell from 8.6 million metric tons in 2021 to 3.5 million metric tons in 2022, dropping the facility from 29th place to 145th. Ascend invested in GHG reduction equipment, including a new control device at its chemical facility in Pensacola, Fla., in 2021.
• Rush Island power plant (Mo.): Pollution fell from 7.4 million metric tons in 2021 to 4.5 million metric tons in 2022, causing the plant to move from 44th most polluting to 98th. The facility reduced its electricity generation from 8.2 million MWh in 2021 to 4.9 million MWh in 2022.
• John E. Amos power plant (W.Va.): Pollution dropped from 11.5 million metric tons in 2021 to 7.4 million metric tons in 2022, changing the plant’s ranking from 10th to 39th. The power plant reduced its electricity generation from 12 million MWh in 2021 to 7.3 million MWh in 2022.

What will change in the years to come? 

While power plants are the nation’s biggest individual contributors to global warming, things are getting better. Coal-fired electricity, which emits copious amounts of carbon pollution, is on the decline, and was surpassed in terms of its share of U.S. electricity production by renewable energy in 2022. 

A number of top polluters plan to close or convert one or more generating units in the coming years. The Jim Bridger coal-fired power plant in Wyoming plans to convert two of its generating units to run on methane gas and then close in 2037. The Craig facility in Colorado, which was the 30th largest polluter in the country in 2022, will close all three of its generating units by 2029 at the latest. Six other top 50 polluters have closing dates ranging from 2024 to 2033. 

Additional pollution reductions will result from the Biden administration’s 2024 adoption of new rules to limit pollution from fossil fuel-fired power plants. One rule requires existing coal-fired power plants to control 90 percent of their carbon pollution by 2039. The combination of strong regulation with companies’ compliance could mean less negative impact from this small number of big polluters.

With the cost of renewable energy falling and the amount of clean wind and solar power on the grid surging, there is simply no excuse for allowing America’s biggest polluters to continue to harm our climate and our health. 

Frontier Group intern Hailey Seo provided research and writing assistance.