The Environmental Protection Agency has officially rejected Hawai'i's Regional Haze State Implementation Plan, overriding the state’s plan to clean up haze-causing pollution from aging oil-burning power plants.
The Regional Haze Rule calls for state and federal agencies to work together to improve visibility in 156 national parks and wilderness areas. The rule requires participating states to develop and implement air quality protection plans to reduce the pollution that causes visibility impairment.
In April, the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks sent a letter urging the EPA to fully approve Hawai’i’s plan, stating that “the state of Hawaiʻi submitted a robust regional haze plan revision to the EPA in August 2024, inclusive of strong recommendations made by the National Park Service during multiple required consultation communications.”
Without the plan, nearly 8,000 of tons of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, along with the fine particulate matter they form in the atmosphere, will continue to pollute the air around these plants, making skies in the state’s iconic national parks hazy, according to Earthjustice.
“Hawaiʻi’s stunning national parks are a showcase for some of the most unique and beautiful landscapes in the world,” said Ulla Reeves, clean air program director for the National Parks Conservation Association. “When the EPA disapproved Hawaiʻi’s plan to protect park air, they put parks, visitors and communities at risk.”
Under the Clean Air Act, states must develop plans every ten years to reduce the haze pollution that obscures views in national parks and wilderness areas. Hawaiian Electric proposed and agreed to retire plants instead of installing the required pollution controls.
Then, in an August 2025 letter to the EPA, Hawaiian Electric reversed course and asked the agency to release it from its own commitments, citing speculative “grid reliability” concerns. Those claims were accepted without independent analysis.
“Once again, the law and facts don’t matter at Trump’s EPA, which would rather protect the fossil fuel industry instead of our environment,” said Isaac Moriwake, the managing attorney for Earthjustice’s Mid-Pacific Office. “What’s worse is that the EPA is letting HECO renege on its own promise to shut down these plants, which are among the dirtiest, most costly, and most unreliable plants in the nation.”
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