Navajos intend to sue over proposed coal-fired power plant
By SUSANMONTOYA BRYAN Associated Press Writer
Article Launched: 01/23/2008 04:11:28 PM MST

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.—The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been notified by one of the nation's largest American Indian tribes that it intends to sue over the agency's lack of action on an air permit application for a proposed coal-fired power plant.

The Navajo Nation's Dine Power Authority and Houston-based Sithe Global Power have partnered to build the $3 billion Desert Rock plant, which would be capable of producing electricity for more than 1 million homes in cities across the Southwest.

Navajo Deputy Attorney General Harrison Tsosie told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the tribe and Sithe applied for an air permit in May 2004 but that the EPA has yet to make a ruling.

"Under federal law, the agency has a year to make a determination and issue a decision," Tsosie said. "It has been the practice that they take longer than a year, which is to be expected, but in the case of this particular application ... it has been almost four years."

Wendy Chavez, a spokeswoman with the EPA's regional office in San Francisco, said the agency has received the tribe's notice of intent to sue.

"There just hasn't been sufficient time to review it and comment on it," she said.

The 1,500-megawatt plant would be built on tribal land near the Navajo community of Burnham, southwest of Farmington. The area already is home to two other coal-fired plants.

Some Navajos and environmentalists argue that Desert Rock would harm the environment and residents' health. But DPA and Sithe have touted it as one of the cleanest coal-burning plants in the country and a much-needed source of jobs and revenue for the Navajo Nation.

Tribal officials have said that a delay in construction means a delay in the economic benefits the tribe expects to see from Desert Rock—including millions of dollars in lease payments, taxes and coal royalties.

Tsosie said the notice of intent to sue was the tribe's only option.

"Hopefully, what this does is give them some incentive to consult with the proponents and to see what the glaring issues are for the hold up," he said.

The air permit would set limits for emissions covered under the federal Clean Air Act, such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, particulates and lead emissions. Both federal officials and Desert Rock developers have said the draft permit contains some of the strictest controls ever set for a coal-fired power plant in the United States.

The New Mexico Environment Department and others have criticized the draft permit for not including enforceable conditions to address adverse visibility and for not analyzing mercury or carbon dioxide emissions.

Others have complained that a better understanding of existing air quality conditions in the Four Corners region is needed before acceptable standards can be set for Desert Rock.

The draft permit is currently being reviewed by EPA officials in Washington, D.C., said Colleen McKaughan, associate director of the EPA's air division in San Francisco.

"There are complicated issues, a lot of technical issues and there were a lot of comments so it takes longer to review," she said.

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Sithe Global’s law firm, Bracewell & Giuliani, has filed a letter with the EPA saying it intends to sue the agency for not yet issuing it an air quality permit — one of many needed by Sithe to build its proposed Desert Rock coal-fired power plant in northwestern New Mexico. Sithe is threatening to take legal action if the EPA doesn’t issue the permit within 60 days.

Sithe claims there are no adverse impacts associated with its proposed 1,500 megawatt conventional power plant and that the plant will be the cleanest ever built, but that is far from the case. Already, state and federal agencies have filed comment letters highlighting serious flaws with the facility and its effects on everything from air quality and mercury contamination to haze problems at nearby national parks and harm to endangered species. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the EPA and the New Mexico Department of Environmental Protection have documented how Desert Rock would have significant impact on public health and the environment in the Four Corners.

Please see the attach file submitted by Jeffrey R. Holmstead of Bracwell & Giuliani.

By Kathy Helms
Diné Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — The U.S. Department of Energy is not designating any corridors on the Navajo Nation as part of its energy transport corridor, because it does not have the authority to dictate what Indian nations do on sovereign tribal lands.

But that does not mean that the corridors will not connect with Navajo lands or that the locations of the corridors will not in some way dictate a pathway through the reservation. In the case of Eastern Navajo, the corridor will impact four chapters in the checkerboard area, according to land officials.

“We have some corridors that abut the Nation, and we also know that there are other lands off the reservation that you care about, that you have historical connections to. There could be cultural impacts,” Laverne Kyriss, DOE federal energy corridors project manager, told a handful of concerned tribal officials and grassroots Navajos during a meeting Wednesday in Window Rock.

While the room was packed with federal officials, the general Navajo public was noticeably absent, perhaps because many of them were at work during the 2-5 p.m. hearing.

Or, as pointed out by Anna Frazier of Diné Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment, Elouise Brown of Dooda Desert Rock, and Judy Willetto of the Division of Natural Resources, DOE did “a poor job in advertising the meeting,” so many members of the public were unaware that it was being held or that DOE had changed the location after it was advertised.

The meeting was set for 2-5 p.m. because officials at the Bureau of Land Management offices in Farmington and Albuquerque said that time worked best, Kyriss said, though it was unclear whether that meant best for federal officials or best for the Navajo people.

The federal corridors touch the Nation’s borders in three separate areas as well as edge along NAPI and impact trust and fee lands, but the DOE map showed no detail inside the Nation’s boundaries because, as Kyriss said, designation of corridors on tribal lands is “up to each individual tribe.”

After several complaints, Ihor Hlohowskyj of Argonne National Laboratory projected a map that showed existing pipelines and transmission lines on Navajo and then overlaid those lines with the proposed corridor. Not surprisingly, they lined up.

Arvin Trujillo, executive director for the Division of Natural Resources, speaking on behalf of the Navajo Nation, said that in reviewing the proposed locations of the energy corridors on federal lands outside the boundary of the Navajo Nation, “it is apparent that in order to connect the initial placement of these corridors, pathways through the Navajo Nation will be needed.”

The Navajo Nation currently has existing oil and gas pipelines and electrical transmission lines crossing the reservation. “Through negotiations and following the Nation’s rights of way process, additional requests for new pipelines and transmission lines could be accommodated, but only after following the prescribed processes in place with the Nation.

“The designation of the corridors on federal lands that border the exterior boundaries of the Nation places an undue burden on the Nation to designate similar corridors to accommodate federally designated corridors,” Trujillo said.

“The Nation wants to make it clear that in order to connect the lines developed through this process, the federal government and future developers must work with the Nation,” he said.

The proposed corridor, on average, would be about 3,500 feet wide — a little less than three-quarters of a mile. Trujillo told the feds not to expect Navajo to accommodate a corridor that cuts right across the Nation.

“Establishing a corridor that would average — and again, ‘average’ — 3,500 feet, would be very difficult to put in place, and the Nation would not consider such an effort as being in the best interest of the Nation,” he said.

Disturbing lands outside the Nation that are of cultural or traditional significance also would not be considered in the best interest of Navajo.

Diné CARE’s Frazier reminded the feds, “We all know the history of relocation, and relocatees that have been impacted have been traumatized. To come in and remove them, all because somebody else somewhere in the big cities is going to be using the energy, I don’t think that’s right to do that. We need to be told the truth about these kinds of things.”

She and Dooda’s Brown both asked that the hearing be extended and advertised extensively so that the Navajo people would have a better opportunity to participate. In checking at her chapter house in Dilkon Wednesday morning, Frazier said those present were unaware of the meeting, though DOE said it sent notices of the meeting and location change to all chapters, as well as copies of the Draft EIS.

Elroy Drake, special project person for the Division of Natural Resources’ Narbonna Growth Fund, said the proposal appeared to be “an opportunity for the Navajo Nation to develop renewable energy and have a way to transmit this power to where people are willing to pay for it, primarily California and Phoenix.

“This kind of fits in with what we’d like to do. We’re looking at wind farms and solar farms and developing our own natural gas resources and having a way to transport it out of here. If not, utilize it on the reservation,” he said.

Jimson Joe, executive director of Navajo Department of Emergency Management, said that in looking up documents on the corridor Web site, “There is an indication that you have an emergency plan. ... I’d like to see if I could get a chance to review it. I couldn’t download it because it was a 40-megabyte document.

“You also have a community information document on there, and I need to see if we can get an opportunity to see those reports and information,” to ensure the safety of the Navajo people. The project “is an economic venture,” he said, and one he does not believe benefits the Navajo people.

Larry Rogers, Eastern Navajo Land Commission executive director, and Delegate Charles Damon, vice chairman, raised questions regarding the lines on the map indicating the path of the corridor.

Rogers said the broken black line represents the corridor’s placement on BLM lands. The spaces in between indicate land which could be allotted or privately owned. “Albuquerque BLM did us a map and it shows the full corridor. There are four chapters affected in Eastern,” he said.

Damon told the feds there is a pending land exchange in Eastern Agency that would have an impact on the proposed corridor. He requested the commission and the feds meet to discuss the matter.

The deadline for comments on the Draft PEIS are due by Feb. 14 and may be submitted on the Web at http://corridoreis.anl.gov; via fax to: (866) 524-5904, or by mail to: Westwide Corridor DEIS, Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 S. Cass Ave., Bldg. 900, Mail Stop 4,
Argonne, IL 60439.

Environmentalists and politicians are turning up the heat on coal plants proposed by the investment giant.

By Marc Gunther, senior writer

1/24/08

NEW YORK (Fortune) -- Throughout the West - in Colorado, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming - battles are raging over proposed coal plants. Caught up in two big ones is The Blackstone Group, the global asset manager than went public last year.

Blackstone (BX) owns 80 percent of Sithe Global Power, an independent power producer. Sithe wants to build a 1,500-megawatt plant, known as Desert Rock, on land governed by the Navajo Nation in New Mexico. It also wants to build a 750-megawatt plant called Toquop in southeast Nevada.

If the plants are built - which is no sure thing - they would provide electricity to some of the nation's fastest-growing areas, including Las Vegas and Phoenix. The Desert Rock plant would also deliver a much-needed economic injection into the Navajo Nation, America's largest Indian reservation, many of whose 200,00 residents are poor.

But both projects face powerful opponents. Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico opposes the Desert Rock plant, although there's not a lot he can do to stop it because of the sovereignty granted to the Navajo tribe. In Nevada, U.S. Senator Harry Reid, the Democratic majority leader, vows to do all he can to block Toquop and two other coal plants.

Environmentalists including the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Environmental Defense also want to stop the plants, and that could be a problem for Blackstone. So far, the groups have not targeted Blackstone or its high-profile chairman and CEO, Stephen A. Schwarzman, but it's only a matter of time before Schwarzman is brought into the fray, according to insiders. Blackstone, which managed nearly $100 billion in assets as of last Sept. 30, did not respond to a phone call and e-mail seeking comment.

Blackstone will likely face pointed questions about the coal plants from institutional shareholders, who have lobbied other public companies to disclose their climate-related risks. Coal-fired plants are the single biggest source of greenhouse gases that cause global warming.

"Every ton of global warming pollution that we release today has measurable, real impacts that will last for decades," says Vickie Patton, a Colorado-based lawyer for Environmental Defense and an author of a report called "Climate Alert" that argues against new conventional coal plants in the west.

The $3 billion Desert Rock project has proven particularly controversial. It was endorsed by a 66-7 vote of the Navajo tribal council, and the tribe's leaders say it will create jobs and generate $50 million in annual revenues for the Navajos. Just as poor countries like China and India have argued that they should not be subject to mandatory controls on their carbon emissions, the Navajos say they are entitled to exploit their energy resources to raise their standard of living. Coal for the plant will be mined on nearby Navajo land.

"The Navajos want to tap their natural resources for the benefit of the nation," says Frank Maisano, a Washington, D.C.-based spokesman for Sithe Global. "They have a lot of coal. They can generate a lot of revenue. And they can provide affordable and reliable power for the region."

The Desert Rock plant, he says, will be far more efficient and less polluting than existing coal plants in the region because it uses newer technologies. The U.S. EPA and the Bureau of Indian Affairs have recommended granting the plant the permits it needs to proceed.

Dissident Navajos, however, have been protesting at the plant's site for more than a year. They commissioned a 160-page report that argues that the Desert Rock plant violates Dine laws and traditions (Dine is another word for Navajo).

"Mother Earth and Father Sky is part of us as the Dine, and the Dine is part of Mother Earth and Father Sky," the report says. It also argues, as others have, that solar power, wind power and energy efficiency efforts will do more for the tribe's economic development,and provide cheaper electricity over time, than will the coal plant.

Others in New Mexico worry that Desert Rock's mercury emissions will aggravate the state's existing mercury problem, and they complain that the electricity generated by Desert Rock will go to neighboring Arizona. "We get all of the pollution and none of the power," says Gregory Green, an organizer with a New Mexico group called Coalition for Clean and Affordable Energy.

Similar debates are unfolding throughout the Rocky Mountain region, where more than two dozen coal plants have been proposed. Opponents say the costs of building coal plants are rising fast, and that regulation of carbon emissions by the federal government will eventually further increase the cost of coal-generated electricity. Meanwhile, the costs of solar, wind and geothermal power are all declining.

"It's not cheap anymore to build coal plants, no matter what people say," argues Jennifer Coken, director of the Western Clean Energy Campaign, which works with local groups to oppose the plants.

Recently PacifiCorp, a utility that is a subsidiary of MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co., which is a 88 percent owned by Berkshire Hathaway, cited the uncertain regulatory and political environment in dropping plans for coal plants in Oregon and Wyoming. "The energy landscape is changing," Coken said. Various tallies indicate that proposals for between 20 and 31 coal plants have been scrapped in the last 18 months, most because of rising costs, the risk of greenhouse-gas regulation and opposition from environmental groups and state governments.

That's a real problem, counters the coal industry, utility companies and the North American Electric Reliability Corp., or NERC, which assesses future needs for power. They warn that much of the U.S. could face electricity capacity shortages if more power plants are cancelled or delayed.