Acid rain regs will be falling on utilities in '84, but not too hard

Regulations will probably call for sulfur dioxide scrubber retrofits on some older power plants in 1984, but because the action will likely be administrative under the Clean Air Act rather than new legislation, the rulings will be less harsh. A response to Canadian pressures was delayed when administration attention focused on military problems and rejected the first Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposals submitted by the new director as too costly. Failure to take action in 1984, however, will be politically damaging to the administration during an election year. A lack of scientific data hampers decision making, but EPA scientists predict there will be enough information by 1988 to accurately quantify acid-rain damage. EPA must decide which states to include in the regulations, how much to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions, and how to allocate quotas. Complicating the issue is the effect on the jobs of high-sulfur coal miners and the high capital costs of scrubbers. A low-cost retrofit may be possible with a furnace-injection technique now under study. 2 figures, 3 tables. (DCK)