desert-rock-blog.com

Northern Arizona power plant among biggest polluters

Robyn Jackson — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 21:22:03 -0700

Northern Arizona power plant among biggest polluters

Salvador Rodriguez - Cronkite News | January 21, 2012

WASHINGTON — Arizona was the 18th-biggest producer of greenhouse gases among states, and one of its power plants was 13th for greenhouse-gas emissions of more than 6,700 facilities in the country, according to a new government database.

The 2010 greenhouse gas database, launched Wednesday by the Environmental Protection Agency, showed the Navajo Generating Station in northern Arizona put out almost 16.3 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2010, equivalent to the carbon dioxide output of 3.2 million vehicles.

“The Navajo Generating Station is … one of the most polluting and dirtiest coal-powered power plants in the entire country, which also causes a regional haze around the Grand Canyon as well as global warming,” said Bret Fanshaw of the advocacy organization Environment Arizona.

The power plant, in Page, produced 6 million metric tons more greenhouse gas than the state’s second-highest producer, the Springerville Generating Station. The state as a whole produced about 61 million metric tons of greenhouses gases in 2010 from fixed facilities, according to the EPA.

Arizona ranked 12th in the nation for the greenhouse gases from facilities in the minerals sector and 14th for power plants. Power generation dwarfed other sources, accounting for 91 percent of greenhouse gases in the state and more than 72 percent nationwide.

But operators defended the Navajo Generating Station, saying it produces an amount of emissions equivalent to the power it produces for use in Arizona, California and Nevada.

“We’re not surprised NGS is one of the largest contributors of carbon dioxide,” said Scott Harelson, a Salt River Project spokesman. “NGS provides electricity to millions of people in the Southwest.”

He said the plant employs more than 500 people, 80 percent of whom come from the Navajo nation.

Arizona Investment Council President Gary Yaquinto, whose organization advocates on behalf of utility investors, said one of the Navajo Generating Station’s largest customers is the Central Arizona Project, which uses the power to pump water to people in Phoenix, Tucson and other Arizona communities.

“Navajo is still an important piece of our power resources to this state,” he said.

But David Doniger, climate policy director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said that while emissions are not hazardous to people living near a plant, they do contribute to climate change.

“You can’t really say people right next to the Navajo station are in greater danger than people on the other side of the state,” he said. “What happens is it’s contributing to the higher temperatures, to raising the temperature.”

The EPA database includes only facilities emitting more than 25,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases a year, which are required to report the information under the 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act. This week, for the first time, the agency released the data in a website that makes it easy for people to find and visualize how much greenhouse gas local facilities are putting out.

“This right-to-know information is a very powerful tool for people,” Doniger said. “Anybody – high school students, teachers, a mom around a kitchen table, local reporters – it’s a very powerful tool for them to find out who are the biggest carbon dioxide polluters in their backyard.”

The tool lets users present the information using maps, spreadsheets and charts at the national, state and county levels.

“Our hope is that people outside EPA, outside the federal government will use this data as a powerful resource for better decision making,” said Gina McCarthy, assistant administrative officer for the EPA Office of Air and Radiation.

“What we can bank on is that better information will always lead to a better-informed public, which will lead to better environmental protection,” she said at a Wednesday news conference to unveil the tool.

The EPA plans to continue refining the database and will release 2011 results next January with information from 12 more source categories. McCarthy said the “publicly available data enriches and empowers all of us.”

Native American groups challenge federal study of Navajo Generating Station, biiggest source of Southwest air polllution

Robyn Jackson — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 20:29:08 -0700

Native American groups challenge federal study of Navajo Generating Station, biggest source of Southwest air pollution

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Bob Berwyn

EPA looking at pollution controls on coal-fired power plant

By Summit Voice

SUMMIT COUNTY — Some Navajo groups say they’re not happy with a U.S. Department of Interior study on the 35-year-old Navajo Generating Station near Page, Arizona, claiming it’s intended to sway an EPA plan to bolster pollution controls at the plant.

“Everyone who’s forward-thinking about energy knows that where we need to be heading is clean energy instead of dirty coal,” said Wahleah Johns with Black Mesa Water Coalition. “It’s very disappointing to see the U.S. government putting out a study that’s focused on staying stuck in the past rather than the opportunities to move forward.”

According to a press release from a coalition of groups, serious consideration of public health impacts from the coal-burning plant was “glaringly absent.” The study also didn’t analyze the potential benefits in terms of jobs, tribal revenues, pollution reductions, and water use savings from an orderly transition to cleaner energy options than coal.

The study, done by the National Renewable Energy Lab, looked at current employment and tribal revenues from the Navajo Generating Station and its coal mine, the costs of installing selective catalytic reduction technology and other pollution controls to significantly cut emissions of nitrogen oxides and air toxics, and the costs today of purchasing power from other generation sources on the western grid if Navajo Generating Station were closed rather than retrofitted with necessary pollution control upgrades.

“To fully account for the costs of ongoing coal-burning and mining you have to consider the contamination to the land and water and the draining of the aquifer that threaten the livelihoods of ranchers and farmers and weavers and all who rely on those resources,” said Marshall Johnson with To Nizhoni Ani. “Interior’s study doesn’t even begin to account for these costs.”

Because of its old age and air pollution impact on visibility at national parks such as Grand Canyon and Mesa Verde, The Navajo Generating Station is long overdue for an EPA decision on what air pollution control upgrades must be installed to cut its haze-producing gases as required under the Clean Air Act. the upgrades that would also significantly limit the amount of health-threatening pollution emitted by the plant.

The EPA has determined that emissions are clouding visibility at Grand Canyon and 10 other treasured public lands in the Four Corners region. But the Department of Interior — whose Bureau of Reclamation is the largest owner of the Navajo plant — pressed the EPA to delay its decision on pollution control requirements until the NREL study came out.

The Navajo Generating Station emits 25,000 tons of nitrogen oxides a year, third worst out of all coal-burning power plants in the west. Nitrogen oxide is an element in dangerous ground-level ozone (also known as smog), and is a key ingredient in the formation of fine particle pollution that can work its way deep into the lungs and trigger respiratory diseases such as asthma.

Navajo and Hopi people have suffered significantly from asthma and other respiratory problems in areas affected by the coal plant emissions, which can spread far and wide.

There are also other environmental concerns. According to the coalition, coal ash is stored on-site at in unlined pits where it blows into the air on windy days. Coal ash contains numerous dangerous toxins and heavy metals such as arsenic, cadmium, and mercury.

The Navajo Generating Station is also Arizona’s largest single source of carbon pollution, emitting nearly 20 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.

The Native American groups are also concerned about impacts to water, charging that coal mining operations on Black Mesa have depleted Navajo Aquifer storage by 21,000 to 53,000 acre-feet. Ninety percent of the water in the Navajo Aquifer is ancient fossil groundwater that cannot be replenished.

Coal-plant use in West scrutinized

Robyn Jackson — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 13:34:25 -0700

Coal-plant use in West scrutinized

by Ryan Randazzo - Jan. 14, 2012 03:00 PM
The Republic | azcentral.com

Energy experts met in Phoenix on Friday to discuss what it would require to make a large transition from coal to renewable energy in the West to cut carbon emissions tied to climate change.

Coal-fired power plants supply about half the power used in the West. But many power plants are nearing the end of their design life, prompting hope among clean-energy advocates that they will be replaced with less-polluting power sources.

Regulators and environmentalists concerned about global climate change want to close the coal plants for good. Coal-mining companies and utilities that rely heavily on coal want to keep them running and open new coal plants.

A host of environmental regulations are making coal plants more expensive to operate as utilities are forced to add pollution controls. But even for utilities willing to make that investment, there is no widely available technology that can eliminate greenhouse-gas emissions from plants.

A regional example of the struggle is the Navajo Generating Station near Page that supplies power to several utilities, including Salt River Project and the Central Arizona Project canal. That power plant is negotiating with the Environmental Protection Agency over the type of pollution controls it needs.

Environmentalists want to close it for a variety of reasons, including that it is a large greenhouse-gas emitter. Because the EPA doesn't regulate greenhouse-gas emissions, environmentalists challenge the plant based on other pollutants.

SRP officials want to keep that plant running, but in other cases, when the environmental upgrades are too expensive, utilities are deciding how to replace coal with either natural gas, which releases fewer greenhouse gasses, or intermittent renewable sources such as solar and wind.

The entire region faces similar choices.

In a decade, more than half the coal-fired power plants in the West will be 40 or more years old, and in 20 years, more than 90 percent will be that old, according to John Candelaria, an energy analyst with the Aspen Environmental Group in Sacramento, Calif.

Arizona already has been affected by the 2005 closing of the Mohave Generating Station in Laughlin, Nev. It opened in 1971 and was shuttered after environmentalists sued over its pollution and it lost its fuel contract.

More recently, Arizona Public Service Co. has proposed closing three of the five units at the Four Corners Power Plant near Farmington, N.M., and adding pollution controls to the remaining units to keep them open.

"We are able to keep a diverse energy portfolio and able to do it at a low cost," Arvin Trujillo, manager of government relations for Four Corners, said of the plan, which is awaiting regulatory approval.

Trujillo, a member of the Navajo Nation, which leases the site to the Four Corners Power Plant and the coal mine that supplies it, said that keeping some of the units open also is important for supporting the Navajo economy.

The plant and the supporting mine bring $225 million annually to the New Mexico and Navajo economies, according to APS. About 1,000 people, more than three quarters of them Native Americans, work at the mine and power plant.

After working 12 years for the tribe and watching officials consider opening chapters in Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Albuquerque because so many tribal members must move away for employment, Trujillo said it is crucial to keep some jobs on the reservation.

More than half of the tribe's operating revenue comes from mineral leases on coal mines, along with land leases and jobs from the power plants.

"You can't get a royalty from the sun," Trujillo said. "You can't get a royalty from the wind."

But his words sparked a rebuke from another member of the Navajo Nation in the audience.

Marshall Johnson, a member of a group known as To' Nizhoni Ani that is trying to get more pollution controls added to regional coal-fired power plants, said Trujillo was overstating the benefits to the Navajo people.

"We definitely have no net benefit from this operation," Johnson said.

He said that coal mining has depleted the aquifer on the reservation and that Phoenix-area residents pay about one-fourth the cost of water as many people on the reservation, because of cheap power from the Navajo Generating Station that is used to pump Colorado River water to Phoenix.

He said the benefits of the coal plants and mines are not shared equally with the tribe, which is faced with all of the environmental issues related to the three major plants on or near the reservation.

He also said that the tribe could benefit financially from solar-power plants built over the reservation's coal mines.

Trujillo's words also prompted a rebuke from Arizona Corporation Commissioner Paul Newman, who was in the audience.

Newman also said the tribe could benefit from solar and wind development on the reservation, but the economic benefits might not be as "robust" as royalties from coal.

Dangerous Navajo power plant emissions documented in EPA interactive map

Robyn Jackson — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:55:15 -0700

Dangerous Navajo power plant emissions documented in EPA interactive map

Navajo coal-fired power plants, oil and gas industry, poisoning Navajo atmosphere, major source of greenhouse gases

Posted January 13, 2012
By Brenda Norrell

The US EPA has released an interactive map showing the greenhouse gas emissions from the Navajo Nation’s three power plants and other poisonous large facilities in Indian country.

The dangerous toxins released by Navajo power plants at the Navajo Generating Station at Page, Ariz, and the Four Corners Generating Station and San Juan Generating Station in northwest New Mexico, are documented on the map.

There are other dangerous toxic releases on Navajoland that people are unaware of. These include the El Paso Natural Gas station in St. Michaels near the Navajo capitol of Window Rock, Ariz., and gas emissions in the Bloomfield, N.M., area. The Bloomfield area is inundated with oil and gas drilling, and power plant emissions. This area is the sacred Place of Origin, Dinetah, of Navajos.

The EPA map reveals carbon monoxide, nitrous oxide and methane emissions. The graphs reveal the Navajo power plants, and other power plants in the US, are responsible for the largest portion of greenhouse gases.

Louise Benally, Navajo resisting relocation at Big Mountain, Ariz., on the Navajo Nation urged Navajos and their supporters to bring a halt to the massive coal fired power plant industry responsible for disease, the depletion of the aquifers and destroying the quality of life for Navajos.

On the Navajo Nation, there have been no studies which analyze the combined health dangers to Navajos of coal mines, power plants, gas plumes, toxic dumping and the radioactive uranium mine tailings from the Cold War.

These multiple health dangers are concentrated in the Four Corners area and the region of Page, Monument Valley and Black Mesa near the Arizona and Utah border. Another area of toxic contamination is the Gallup, N.M., region due to the current oil and gas releases, and the radiation that flowed down the Rio Puero after the Church Rock, N.M. uranium tailings spill.

"It is to time to slay the beast," Benally told those gathered in Tucson on Tuesday, Jan. 10, rallying to save ethnic studies. Benally said the same corporate beast responsible for the racism and imperialism that now forbids Mexican American studies in Arizona, is the same corporate beast which targets Navajos with genocidal coal mining, power plants and oil and gas drilling.

Benally and other Navajos recently joined O'odham to protest the Salt River Project, which operates the Navajo Generating Station. SRP is also responsible for drying up the waterways which O'odham depended on for their way of life and farming in southern Arizona. The protest was during the American Legislative Exchange Council, ALEC, described by protesters as corporate profiteers coopting Arizona legislators, promoting private prisons and targeting Indian country with genocidal coal fired power plants, mining and drilling.

New standards will impact local power plants

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 12:29:58 -0700

New standards will impact local power plants

By Cindy Yurth
Tséyi' Bureau

CHINLE, Jan. 5, 2012

Navajo Times

Stringent new emissions standards announced by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last month will eventually eliminate most of the mercury and other toxic emissions at the five aging power plants on or near the Navajo Nation.

But opponents of the new "MATS" - mercury and air toxin standards - say they will also dissipate jobs. Those include President Ben Shelly, who said Tuesday the new rules "will only make the good paying jobs on and near the Navajo Nation that much harder to find and maintain."

Together, the coal-burning power plants close enough to affect air quality on the Navajo Nation - Navajo, Cholla, Four Corners, San Juan and Escalante - have released 14.6 million pounds of mercury, chromium, lead, nickel and hydrochloric acid into the air in the last decade, according to the EPA's toxic release inventory.

All the substances have been proven to harm human health, and all would have to be reduced under the new rule.

Just how much they would have to be reduced will vary with the type of coal burned at each plant and the nature of the equipment.

Nationwide, the EPA hopes to eventually eliminate 91 percent of the mercury now in the air, and significant quantities of the other airborne toxins, according to its Web site.

The rule was announced Dec. 16 and will take effect 90 days after being read into the Congressional Record.

Federal air quality standards on power plants have been nearly two decades in the making. A 1993 study found that fossil-fuel-burning power plants were a major contributor to the country's air pollution, and in 2000 the EPA found it was "appropriate and necessary" to regulate them.

However, every time it tried to do so, it got sued by state and industry groups for allegedly doing too much, or by environmental and health lobbies for allegedly doing too little.

The EPA says on its Web site the new standards are attainable using existing technology. They will cost about $9.6 billion to implement, but will save the country an estimated $24 to $80 billion in health care costs and lost productivity due to premature deaths and mental retardation (which sometimes results when a pregnant woman is exposed to high levels of mercury).

Wahleah Johns of the Black Mesa Water Coalition said she has yet to study the rule in detail, but any federal regulation of power plant emissions is good news for Navajos living on the reservation and breathing some of the most polluted air in the West.

"It's big news, because until now there hasn't been federal enforcement of these emissions," she said, noting that states and municipalities have failed to regulate them adequately because they are major consumers of the electricity the plants produce.

"We're very happy the EPA stood their ground on behalf of our children," Johns stated.

But, says Shelly, those children are going to have to work somewhere, and the five plants employ hundreds of Navajos close to home. If the plants start shutting down because they can't afford to upgrade their equipment, it's going to be bad news for Diné Bikéyah, he warned.

Fresh from slamming the EPA in the Santa Fe New Mexican for giving New Mexico's Regional Haze Plan the thumbs down, Shelly again assailed the agency for failing to consult with the tribes before publishing the 1,000-page MATS rule.

"We had hoped the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would have engaged in 'meaningful consultation' with the Navajo Nation as set forth in the 2009 memorandum by President Barrack Obama," Shelly wrote in an email to the Times.

Johns doesn't buy the job loss argument.

"Just think how many Navajos are going to be employed installing the new equipment," she said. "This rule is going to create jobs, not destroy them."

And if the plants do, in fact, have to shut down, something is going to have to go up to replace all that lost electricity, she argued.

"It opens the door wide for alternative energy," Johns said.

Shelly said that, because of the soil content, hazardous elements exist naturally in the Four Corners and the EPA should have considered that before setting the standards.

But Richard Grossman, a Durango obstetrician/gynecologist who recently studied mercury concentrations in the hair of Native Americans living in Shiprock, pointed to a 2005 study published in the journal "Applied Geochemistry" that traced nearly all the mercury detected in southwestern Colorado's Narraguinnep reservoir to the advent of nearby power plants - in spite of the fact that the surrounding bedrock also contains mercury.

Although Grossman's research actually found lower-than-average levels of mercury in the local Natives (probably because Navajos aren't big on fish), he's still a big fan of the new EPA rules.

"I think that the EPA change is very important and a bit late in coming," Grossman emailed to the Times. "About two-thirds of the mercury currently in the environment is anthropogenic (human-caused), and about 40 percent is from coal-fired power plants."

Shelly said that in any case, the Navajo Nation has a big stake in the rules and will need to be proactive in preparing for them.

"We plan to thoroughly review the standards and will proceed with a plan of action that will protect the public health, environment, and preserve existing jobs and the Navajo economy," he promised.

Under the new rules, power plants would have four years to comply.

L.A.'s Dirty Coal Addiction Is Killing Arizona

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 13:09:46 -0700

L.A.'s Dirty Coal Addiction Is Killing Arizona

A large percentage of the power Angelenos depend on comes from coal plants, which spew their filth hundreds of miles away, across state lines in Indian country.

December 29, 2011

When one thinks of coal country, Los Angeles is probably not what immediately comes to mind. Appalachia and the Powder River Basin, sure, but not this sun-drenched stretch of coastline. Not highbrow Brentwood or the mansion-lined streets of Beverly Hills. Not star-studded Hollywood or the surf breaks of Santa Monica. Not here, in the heart of it all.

In part this an accurate assessment. California as a whole has no active coal mines and only a handful of small coal-fired power plants. L.A.'s infamous smog isn't generated from dirty coal plants nearby, nor is the pollution that hugs up against the San Gabriel Mountains the result of burning coal. Nonetheless, a large percentage of the power Angelenos depend on to run their air conditioners and light their buildings comes from coal plants -- plants that spew their filth hundreds of miles away, across state lines in Indian country. This filth is all out of sight and out of mind for most who call L.A. home.

While California is often cited as one of the most energy efficient states in the country, coal still plays a large role in producing energy for the state. When in-state generation, (some 461 MW) is added to out-of-state coal-based electricity (approximately 3,500 MW) California ranks 28th in the United States in coal-fired power generation. Nearly all of this electricity generated by coal ends up in the southern half of the state.

L.A., as you may have guessed, is no small energy market. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP), which derives 44 percent of its power from coal, boasts of a customer base of over 1.37 million households. Two massive generating stations serve LADWP's needs, the Navajo Generating Station and Intermountain Power Station, in Arizona and Utah respectively.

Environmentalists and others have long criticized the Navajo Generating Station for polluting communities near the plant, which are largely made up of people from the Navajo Nation. Annually, the plant spews more than 19 million tons of carbon dioxide and according to the Clean Air Task Force, a nonprofit research organization, the plant is responsible for 16 deaths per year due to its fine particle pollution. This dust-size pollution is made of up a complex mixture of soot, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. It is a nasty mix of toxins that causes severe asthma and even cancer.

Navajo Nation is massive, encompassing all of northeastern Arizona, a southeastern chunk of Utah as well as northwestern New Mexico. It's the largest reservation in the United States and has a population of 300,000 people. Coal mining operations and power plants on these lands, which includes an area shared with the Hopi, accounts for 1,500 jobs, a total of one-third of the tribe's annual operating budget.

Since 2005 two coal mines on the reservation have been shut down, including the one that fed the Black Mesa power station, which halted operations when the nearby Mojave Generating Station ceased. Such strides have given hope to many fighting coal in these all-but-forgotten areas.

"It's a new day for the Navajo people," says Lori Goodman, an official with Diné Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment (Diné CARE), a group founded 22 years ago. "We can't be trashing the land anymore."

On December 2, 16 people were arrested in Tempe, Arizona for protesting outside the offices of the Salt River Project (SRP) the managing partner of the Navajo plant. The protest was one of several that took place across the state targeting the American Legislative Exchange Council. ALEC is a nonprofit made up of corporations and state politicians around the country who vote in private on "model bills" that benefit the very corporations that support the organization. SRP is a member of ALEC and also holds a seat on its corporate board.

"My community is heavily impacted by Salt River Project's coal and water extraction activities. SRP has extensive ties to Peabody Energy's massive mining operations and the Navajo Generating Station," says Louise Benally of nearby Black Mesa. "Coal mining has destroyed thousands of archeological sites and our only water source has been seriously compromised. Their operations are causing widespread respiratory problems, lung diseases, and other health impacts on humans, the environment, and all living things."

Native American activist Ofelia Rivas, of the O'odham people, was also on hand to criticize SRP, claiming the company continues to divert water from O'odham lands for profit, devastating the agricultural way of life of the O'odham. LADWP owns a 22 percent stake in SRP's Navajo coal-fired power plant.

This is not to say that all in LA, including Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, are okay with LADWP's investment in coal. The agency's 2010 Integrated Resource Plan, a 20 year strategic vision, cited a need for major investments in renewable energies, as well as a call for ending purchases of power from both the Intermountain Power Station and the Navajo plant. It was a bold proclamation, but one that is likely not going to happen in the proposed 20-year timeframe. In fact, by December 2010 the plan's renewable energy goals were in peril with the objectives set forth in the plan already requiring revision.

California, compared to most states, has taken important measures toward weaning the state off dirty fossil fuels. One such initiative, SB 1368, prohibits public utilities from building new coal plants or entering into new long-term arrangements with plants that emit more than 1,100 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour.

Because no commercially available technology can meet that standard, SB 1368 has stopped new coal plants both inside and outside the state.

These are all good measures, but they don't go far enough in cracking down on SRP's activities in Arizona, contend activists intent on shutting the plant down. Currently SRP is debating whether or not to invest in the Navajo Station to install scrubbers to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions, which contributes to acid rain and is regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The costs of these upgrades could reach $600,000 million to $1 billion to install.

SRP says this could add about $13 million a year to the plant's operating budget and those expenses would be passed on to customers. The EPA has proposed a scrubbing system which uses ammonia to reduce SO2. The ammonia would be injected into the system after the coal is burned to leach out SO2. To reach the plant, the ammonia would be delivered to Flagstaff by railroad and then trucked over to Page where the only service is a direct rail line from the Kayenta coal mine that produces coal for the plant. This whole ordeal has caused LADWP to consider whether or not it wants to support the retrofit or walk away from the plant altogether.

These sorts of tussles did not stop the international development company Sithe Global Power from proposing the so-called Desert Rock power plant on Navajo land. The plant would have been the third power plant within a 15-mile vicinity of two other plants. Diné CARE, among other groups, opposed the plant on the grounds that it would have disproportionately impacted the Navajo people. Diné CARE in 2006 brought substantial attention to the plant by blockading the road that lead to the proposed site. Protesters were arrested, but the fight continued, with the Sierra Club announcing in March 2011 that Sithe Global had finally abandoned its plans for the plant.

Southern California Edison also announced in 2010 that the company was going to divest its 48-percent stake in New Mexico's Four Corners power station by 2016. While this was a significant victory for those seeking to end coal operations on Navajo land, the nearby Reid Gardner power plant in Arizona has caused more than a few headaches.

Like the Navajo power plant, the majority of Reid Gardner's electrical output ends up in California, while the immediate environmental and health impacts occur locally. In a report published by Earthjustice and Sierra Club in 2011, Reid Gardner was cited as having high levels of chromium seeping into local groundwater supplies. Chromium, made infamous by Erin Brockovich's fight with Pacific Gas & Electric, is nasty stuff for humans when it makes its way into drinking water.

"My neighbors and I feel coal pollution up close. Our children and elders suffer from asthma and other respiratory ailments, and that makes the issue immediate and personal," explains William Anderson, chairman of the Moapa Band of Paiutes, a tribe that lives right under Reid Gardner's smokestacks.

"Our children are losing more than their health because of the power plants; they're losing their culture, too. We used to hunt ducks and geese on our land--but no longer. The birds land in the coal wastewater ponds. We used to harvest medicinal plants, but not anymore. The plants have been contaminated over the years by the plant's coal ash dust, soot and other pollutants," adds Anderson. "Air quality and public-health safeguards should not depend on political winds driven by those who never have to inhale the pollution they authorize."

The Moapa people Anderson represents and many Navajo agree: Californians, especially those living in LA, should demand clean energy production that not only creates jobs for native people, but also improves their health by forcing these dirty plants to shutter their doors as soon as possible.

Joshua Frank is an environmental journalist and author of "Left Out! How Liberals Helped Reelect George W. Bush." He is co-editor, with Jeffrey St. Clair, of "Red State Rebels: Tales of Grassroots Resistance in the Heartland." Frank and St. Clair are also the authors of the forthcoming book, "Green Scare: The New War on Environmentalism." He can be reached at brickburner@gmail.com

EPA to limit power-plant pollution

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 14:04:59 -0700

EPA to limit power-plant pollution

By DINA CAPPIELLO

Associated Press

Dec 22, 2011

WASHINGTON – Clean up or shut down.

That’s the decision facing hundreds of the nation’s oldest and dirtiest power plants under an Environmental

Protection Agency rule announced Wednesday that will force plants to control mercury and other toxic

pollutants for the first time.

The long overdue national standards rein in the largest remaining source of uncontrolled toxic

pollution in the U.S. – the emissions from the nation’s coal- and oil-fired power plants, which

have been allowed to run for decades without addressing their full environmental and public

health costs.

The impact of the ruling will be greatest in the Midwest and in the coal belt – Kentucky, West

Virginia and Virginia – where dozens of units likely will be mothballed, according to an

Associated Press survey. The majority of facilities will continue to run, and find ways to reduce

pollution.

About half of the 1,200 coal- and oil-fired units nationwide still lack modern pollution controls,

despite the EPA in 1990 getting the authority from Congress to control toxic air pollution from

power plant smokestacks. A decade later, in 2000, the agency concluded it was necessary to

clamp down on the emissions to protect public health.

At a news conference Wednesday at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, EPA

Administrator Lisa Jackson said the regulation was the Obama administration’s “biggest clean air action

yet,” trumping a landmark agreement to double fuel economy standards for vehicles and another rule that

will reduce emissions from power plants that foul the air in states downwind.

The administration was under court order to issue a new rule, after a court threw out an attempt

by the Bush administration to exempt power plants from toxic air pollution controls.

“Before this rule, there were no national standards limiting the amount of mercury, arsenic,

chromium, nickel and acid gases that power plants across the country could release into the air

that we breathe,” said Jackson, listing the contaminants linked to cancer, IQ loss, heart disease

and lung disease that are covered by the rule and that also pollute lakes, streams and fish.

In a video released Wednesday afternoon, President Barack Obama said the decades of delays

caused by special interest groups that resulted in standards never being put into place for power

plants “was wrong.”

Today, my administration is saying, ‘Enough,’” he said.

When fully implemented in 2016, the standards will slash mercury pollution from burning coal by 90

percent, lung-damaging acid gases by 88 percent and soot-producing sulfur dioxide by 41

percent.

Power plant operators will have to choose between installing pollution control equipment,

switching to cleaner-burning natural gas, or shutting down the plant. None of those choices

come cheap – the EPA estimates the rule will cost $9.6 billion annually, making it one of the

most expensive the agency has ever issued.

Some power producers intensely lobbied the Obama administration to weaken the rule and to

delay it, and Republicans in Congress passed legislation to do so, saying it would threaten jobs

and the reliability of the power grid, and raise electricity prices.

To ease those concerns, the administration will encourage states to make “broadly available” an

additional fourth year to comply with the rule, as allowed by the law. Case-by-case extensions

could also be granted to address local reliability issues, according to a presidential

memorandum sent Wednesday to Jackson.

In the memorandum, Obama directs the EPA to ensure that implementation of the rule “proceed

in a cost-effective manner that ensures electric reliability.”

Environmentalists said Wednesday that the added flexibility did not jeopardize the public health

benefits of the regulation.

“After more than two decades of delay, dirty coal-fired power plants are going to be cleaned up

in short order,” said Frank O’Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, who said the EPA “bent over

backwards” to accommodate concerns about reliability.

For those in the industry, and some in Congress, the concessions didn’t go far enough.

Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe, the top Republican on the Senate’s environment committee, said

he would file a joint resolution, a rarely used Congressional tactic, to get the rule overturned.

Some in the industry pushed for an automatic delay, or “safety valve,” to make sure that plants

that have to run to ensure reliability aren’t found in violation of the rule and too many plants don’t close

down at once. In addition to those that will retire, hundreds of units will need to be idled temporarily to

install pollution control equipment. Some of those units are at critical junctions on the grid and are essential

to restarting the electrical network in case of a blackout, or making sure voltage doesn’t drain completely

from electrical lines, like a hose that’s lost its water pressure.

The Edison Electric Institute, whose members were split on the toll of the rule, said in a

statement Wednesday that while the EPA “made useful technical changes”, it believes “the

administration is underestimating the complexity of implementing this rule in such a short period

of time.”

The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, which is an association of companies

producing electricity from coal, said the rule will destroy jobs, raise the cost of energy and make

electricity less reliable. A study by the group estimated that as much as 12 percent of coal-fired

generation would be forced to retire because of the regulation.

But an AP survey of 55 power plant producers found that estimate, and others, to be inflated.

The mercury rule, along with another to reduce power plant pollution that blows downwind, will

force portions of more than 32 mostly coal-fired power plants in a dozen states to retire, and put

another 36 power plants on the brink of retirement.

But not a single operator interviewed said the EPA was solely to blame for the decision. And coal is still

likely to be the country’s dominant electricity source until 2035, according to the Energy Information

Administration.

For the older, aging plants, many of which only ran when electricity demand peaked, the rules

were the final blow. Coal was already struggling to compete against low natural-gas prices,

demand from China and elsewhere driving up its price, and lower electricity demand.

The average age of the units retiring or at risk of shutting down was 51 years old, the AP found.

And while they produce enough power for more than 22 million households, experts say they

probably won’t cause the lights to go out, because in many cases the power is being replaced.

An end-of-year gift from EPA: Less mercury

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 14:27:15 -0700

An end-of-year gift from EPA: Less mercury

Durango Herald

Dec.21, 2011

The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday issued the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards for coal-burning power plants. This is great news.

Here in the Four Corners, we have been inundated with mercury, arsenic, acid gas, nickel, selenium and cyanide from coal plants for many years.

Over the last 10 years, the Four Corners Power Plant west of Farmington has poured more than 2 million pounds of pollutants into the air, including more than 6,000 pounds of mercury, nearly 3,000 pounds each of carcinogenic chromium and nickel, more than 3,700 pounds of lead, and nearly a half million pounds of hydrochloric acid.

Last year alone, Four Corners pumped 465 pounds of mercury into the air.

For the San Juan Generating Station, also west of Farmington, the numbers are similar, with more than 4,600 pounds of mercury and more than 2,100 pounds of lead emitted over the last 10 years.

Mercury is a lump of coal that keeps on giving. According to the EPA, “Mercury has been shown to harm the nervous systems of children exposed in the womb, impairing thinking, learning and early development.”

It also bio-accumulates, which means that it builds up in fatty tissue and is passed from fish to humans, as well as to eagles and other birds of prey. Locally, we have seen mercury in fish at levels high enough to limit how many of them we should eat. Reduced levels going into our airshed will mean less going into our streams and lakes.

The other air pollutants that will be reduced are also deadly. Arsenic, chromium and nickel are known human carcinogens that can cause lung, bladder, kidney and skin cancer. Acid gases such as hydrogen chloride and hydrogen fluoride cause lung damage and contribute to asthma, bronchitis and other chronic respiratory disease, especially in children and the elderly.

The coal plants that have already installed appropriate pollution controls are testimony to the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of these safeguards. The utilities that are opposing the safeguards want to continue polluting while others are cutting pollution.

The new rules are not a surprise; power plants have known since 1990 that they would need to reduce toxic emissions under the Clean Air Act, and many have planned ahead and done so. In fact, more than half of all U.S. coal plants are currently meeting the EPA’s proposed limits for mercury through a variety of control technologies, including scrubbers, bag houses and carbon-injection systems.

The value of the health benefits of pollution controls outweigh their costs by at least 5 to 1 and as much as 13 to 1. In other words, every dollar spent to cut toxics from coal plants will result in $5 to $13 in health benefits by saving up to 17,000 lives a year and preventing thousands of heart attacks and hospital and emergency room visits, and hundreds of thousands of asthma attacks and missed work days.

Clearly this is a great present to everyone living downwind of a coal power plant, and here in the San Juan Basin we have real reason to celebrate.

dan@sanjuancitizens.org. Dan Randolph is executive director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance.

Will the EPA's mercury rule cause a wave of blackouts? No.

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 11:06:08 -0700

Will the EPA’s mercury rule cause a wave of blackouts? No.

Posted by Brad Plumer at 08:45 AM ET, 12/21/2011

Later this afternoon, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson is expected to roll out the agency’s new regulations on mercury and toxic pollution from coal-fired power plants. That raises some questions: Just how many plants will end up getting shuttered as a result of all of the EPA’s new air-pollution rules? And how much of a pain will this be?

The main plant facility at the Navajo Generating Station in Page, Ariz., which could be at risk of closure. (Ross D. Franklin/AP)It’s a hotly debated topic these days, with industry groups (and plenty of Republicans)predicting possible blackouts and economic havoc, while environmentalists have mostly been rolling their eyes. So, to help settle this debate, the AP’s Dina Cappiello recently surveyed 55 power-plant operators across the country. She found that as many as 68 coal-fired plants — up to 8 percent of the nation’s coal generation capacity — will shut down in the years ahead. (The Edison Electric Institute has estimated that up to 14 percent of coal capacity could be retired by 2022.) That’s no easy task. But, from the available evidence, it also won’t likely prove apocalyptic.

Cappiello’s survey found that the coal plants set to be mothballed are mostly ancient — the average age was 51 — and largely run without modern-day pollution controls, as many of them were grandfathered in under the Clean Air Act. What’s more, many of these plants were slated for retirement in the coming years regardless of what the EPA did, thanks to state air-quality rules, rising coal prices, and the influx of cheap natural gas. “In the AP’s survey,” she writes, “not a single plant operator said the EPA rules were solely to blame for a closure, although some said it left them with no other choice.”

Crucially, none of the operators contacted by the AP seemed to think that huge swaths of America were on the verge of losing power, as Jon Huntsman claimed. An official from the North American Reliability Corporation put it this way: “We know there will be some challenges. But we don’t think the lights are going to turn off because of this issue.” This jibes with an Edison Electric Institute study, as well as a Department of Energy study(which focused on worst-case scenarios), a study from M.J. Bradley & Associates, and the EPA’s own modeling (PDF). Utilities will manage to keep the power running, in part by switching to natural gas, as plenty of gas plants currently operate well below capacity.

At this point, there’s good reason to think that utilities can retire their oldest and dirtiest plants without crushing disruptions. It won’t be simple or cost-free — the EPA estimates that the mercury and air toxics rule alone will cost utilities at least $11 billion by 2016 to install scrubbers on their coal plants, and those costs will likely get passed on to households. On the flip side, the reduction in mercury is expected to prevent some 17,000 premature deaths per year and provide an estimated $59 billion to $140 billion in health benefits in 2016.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/will-the-epas-mercury-rule-cause-a-wave-of-blackouts-no/2011/12/20/gIQALEu88O_blog.html

Mercury rules target area power plants

Robyn Jackson — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:15:21 -0700

Mercury rules target area power plants

By Chuck Slothower cslothower@daily-times.com

Posted: 12/20/2011 01:00:00 AM MST

FARMINGTON — New federal mercury rules are expected to have little effect on the Four Corners Power Plant despite the plant's status as New Mexico's top mercury emitter.

That's because plant operator Arizona Public Service Co. already plans to shut down three of the plant's five units, a move that would reduce mercury emissions by 61 percent.

"Moving forward, we'll be in good shape to meet that standard," APS spokesman Damon Gross said. The looming mercury standard played a part in APS' decision to propose closing the three older units, he said.

The EPA was expected to release the mercury rules Monday, but had not done so by press time.

The planned closure is part of APS' proposal, announced in November 2010, to buy shares of the plant's two newest units from Southern California Edison.

APS has agreed to pay $294 million for the California utility's 48 percent share of units 4 and 5, which would give the Phoenix-based utility majority ownership of units 4 and 5. APS currently owns only 15 percent of those units.

The purchase still is awaiting approval from state and federal regulators.

"We have been preparing to comply with a new mercury standard for several years," said Alan Bunnell, another APS spokesman.

Shutting down the plant's three older units would cut electricity generation by 560 megawatts, but also would sharply reduce emissions of several pollutants. In addition to reducing mercury emissions, nitrogen oxide emissions would fall by 36 percent, particulates by 43 percent, carbon dioxide by 30 percent and sulfur dioxide by 24 percent, APS says.

"For mercury, the units already have bag houses, and we will be using activated carbon injection," Bunnell said.

Four Corners Power Plant, which went online in 1963, is part of a generation of large, aging, coal-fired power plants targeted by the EPA's mercury rules.

The plant emitted 465 pounds of airborne mercury in 2010, by far the most in New Mexico. San Juan Generating Station, the other coal-fired power plant in Northwest New Mexico, emitted only 10 pounds, according to the EPA.

Four Corners is the larger of the two plants, producing 2,040 megawatts of electricity to about 300,000 households in New Mexico, Arizona, California and Texas.

San Juan Generating Station likely will be able to meet the new mercury standard without any further upgrades, said Don Brown, spokesman for operator Public Service Co. of New Mexico. An upgrade completed in 2009 gave the plant the ability to remove 99 percent of its mercury emissions.

"We believe the plant's in very good shape to meet that rule," Brown said.

While there are worries nationally that the mercury rules will lead to layoffs, none are planned at Four Corners, Gross said. Any needed job cuts will be achieved through routine employee retirements and attrition.

"Assuming our plan is approved as proposed, there will be no layoffs," Gross said.

Units 4 and 5 may have the advantage of being easier to retrofit, said Mike Eisenfeld, New Mexico energy coordinator for San Juan Citizens Alliance, a Durango, Colo.-based environmental group.

But Eisenfeld questioned the wisdom of continuing to invest in a decades-old coal-fired plant.

"It's going to be tough for them to continue to rely on these facilities," he said. "They're getting into the retrofit mode with everything. The price of coal is going up, up, up, and the price of renewable is coming down."

Eisenfeld added, "Continuing to rely on a 50-year-old coal plant is not very visionary, in my opinion."