How will the proposed rule affect the U.S. portland cement industry?
As written, the proposed rule would be devastating to the U.S. cement industry. The U.S. cement industry already faces extreme pressure from foreign competitors that do not have to comply with rigorous environmental or labor standards. Requiring U.S. cement manufacturers to comply with the MACT approach will result in much higher manufacturing costs and undermine the ability for U.S. cement to compete with foreign products. Further, because adopting all of the emissions control technologies in the rule is neither practical nor economically feasible, it is likely that many U.S. cement jobs will have to move to foreign locations.
