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High Country News: The Life and Death of Desert Rock

Robyn Jackson — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 14:49:04 -0600

The life and death of Desert Rock

The Navajo Nation’s proposed coal plant always rested on shaky
ground. Now, it may collapse entirely.

News - August 13, 2010
by Laura Paskus

More than four decades ago, the Hopi and Navajo tribal councils sold 65,000 acres of coal rights to what was then called Peabody Western Coal. The Black Mesa deal, engineered by a former U.S. attorney who represented the Hopi while working for Peabody on the sly, brought hundreds of jobs to northeastern Arizona. It also forced the relocation of some 10,000 people from land slated for the strip mine. Families and clans were split and relations between the two tribes strained. Starting in 1970, the mine began pumping more than 4,000 acre-feet of groundwater annually to send coal slurry 273 miles via pipeline to the Mohave Generating Station, dropping the Navajo aquifer and drying up local wells.

Though the Black Mesa Mine closed in 2005, its associated Kayenta Mine still sends coal to the Navajo Generating Station on the reservation near Page, Ariz. In addition to this and the open pit Navajo coal mine, the reservation hosts two of the region’s three coal plants. The tribe owns none of these facilities, and though it receives royalties and tax revenue, it has no say in how they do business.

“Past development in Indian Country was the old formula where companies came in and built projects, but only leased the land and did not include the tribe as equity partners,” says David Lester, a member of the Muscogee Creek Tribe and the executive director of the Denver-based Council of Energy Resource Tribes (CERT). “That old paradigm left us with all the social and environmental costs and none of the economic benefits.”

Given this history, it’s no wonder the Navajo Nation, like many tribes, has tried to take control of resource development on its own land. The tribe’s Desert Rock coal plant was conceived to do just that. In 2003, the Diné Power Authority, created by the tribal council to develop the tribe’s energy resources, announced that the 1,500-megawatt facility would be built by the German company Steag Power (acquired the following year by Sithe Global Power) on Navajo land about 25 miles outside of Farmington, N.M. The tribe itself would own up to a half stake, exploit its large coal reserves, and, when the plant was finished as projected in 2005, send electricity off to markets with its own 500 kilovolt transmission line, which has been in the works since the 1990s.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. hailed the project as an economic victory for the poverty-stricken reservation, where the unemployment rate ranges from 44 to 66 percent. Desert Rock would mean not only jobs -- 200 in BHP Billiton’s expanded Navajo Mine as well as 1,000 construction jobs and 400 operation jobs for the plant itself -- but also $50 million in annual revenue.

At the time it was proposed, the plant seemed to have a solid foundation: The economy was swinging back from a mild recession, real estate was hot and construction was booming, especially in the Southwest and California. To keep pace with a projected doubling in electricity demand, the International Energy Agency called for $1.6 trillion in energy investment through 2030 in Canada and the United States. Regulatory agencies were generally more permissive, and Congress was nowhere near to passing legislation to rein in carbon emissions, while the Bush White House was refusing to acknowledge climate change. Yet despite the tribe’s optimism, a closer look at how it and its partners went about obtaining permits and securing funds shows that Desert Rock always rested upon shaky ground. This March, after seven years of planning and with millions of dollars poured into attorneys, consultants and travel junkets, Sithe Global not only delayed the project once again -- beyond 2015 this time -- but said it is considering changing it extensively. In June, the company gave up the only funding it had secured for construction of the project, when it allowed a $3.2 billion industrial revenue bond and tax break from San Juan County, N.M., to expire. And now, with its champion Shirley stepping down because of term limits this fall, Desert Rock’s days are likely numbered.

From the get-go, the Navajo tribal government’s approach did little to reassure community members that Desert Rock would be different from past projects involving outside companies. To get the land for the plant, for example, the government paid elderly shepherds to sign over their grazing allotments without telling them what the land would be used for. (The tribe needed their permission because reservation land is held in trust for the Navajo by the United States government.) “They would bring a bag of groceries and tell them they would get a thousand dollars,” says Lori Goodman of Diné Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment, or Diné CARE, a Navajo nonprofit formed in the 1980s to fight construction of a toxic waste incinerator and dump. “People told us they were harassed to the point where they got fed up and said, ‘We’ll sign whatever just to get you out of our face,’”

The move alienated many in the Burnham Chapter -- one of 110 local government subdivisions on the reservation -- where the plant would be located, and soon after Desert Rock went public, Burnham’s members defeated a resolution to support the plant. Undeterred, the tribal government adjusted chapter boundaries, pushing Desert Rock onto the neighboring Nenahnezad Chapter, which then passed a resolution supporting it. “That was how it started,” says Goodman. “And it’s been like that ever since.”

So Diné CARE began spreading the word that many Navajo people oppose Desert Rock. Along with the resistance group Dooda (“absolutely not”) Desert Rock, elders and families also began to demonstrate against the plant, organizing blockades against Sithe and occupying a makeshift protest camp at the plant’s site.

Meanwhile, the Four Corners-area nonprofit San Juan Citizens Alliance took notice of the project, and the organization’s New Mexico energy coordinator, Mike Eisenfeld, began poring over regulatory documents, e-mail messages and meeting notes obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests. In 2006, when the project’s lobbyists began seeking tax relief from the New Mexico Legislature, claiming that it was necessary to make Desert Rock economically viable, Eisenfeld was there. “When (lobbyist Dick) Minzer was asked if they had their permits, he said, ‘Yes,’” says Eisenfeld with a shake of his head. “And we’re in the back” -- he raises his hand – “saying, ‘No!’”

For three years running, the Legislature denied the lobbyists’ requests, in large part because of the proposed plant’s environmental impact on the state, says state Sen. Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe. Even so, opposition to the plant came almost entirely from the three grassroots groups. New Mexico’s congressional delegation either supported the project, as with now-retired Sen. Pete Domenici, R, or deferred to tribal sovereignty, as with Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D. And Sen. Tom Udall, D, formerly a U.S. representative, has consistently said Desert Rock would mean much-needed economic development for the Navajo. It wasn’t until five years into the project’s planning that the state of New Mexico itself stepped directly into the fray.

In July 2008, the Environmental Protection Agency determined that Desert Rock would not worsen pollution in the Four Corners region and issued it a key air-quality permit. Three months later, New Mexico joined environmental groups in appealing the decision. The state contended that the EPA failed to consider how Desert Rock would affect visibility within nearby national parks and failed to consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on how the plant’s emissions might increase water-borne levels of mercury and selenium and affect two endangered fish in the San Juan River. The state also asked the agency to consider evidence it had previously ignored -- that regional ozone pollution levels exceeded federal health-based air quality standards even without Desert Rock, which would add not only ozone and greenhouse gas emissions, but also mercury, sulfates, nitrates, carbon monoxide and both fine and large particulate matter. The region already hosts three coal plants, including the 1,800-megawatt San Juan Generating Station and the 2,200-megawatt Four Corners plant, as well as tens of thousands of oil and gas wells.

As a result of the appeal, the EPA announced it was reconsidering portions of the air permit in early 2009. Nine months later, it reversed its Bush-era decision entirely -- in part because the permit lacked emission limitations for carbon dioxide. Developers had also had failed to complete a required consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on the two endangered fish. Shortly after that, the Bureau of Indian Affairs withdrew its biological opinion in support of the plant, acknowledging that Fish and Wildlife had “significant concerns” about the impact of the plant’s potential mercury and selenium discharges on the San Juan River’s fish. Without that document, the project’s environmental impact statement remains incomplete. And without that, most other permits -- for mine expansion to feed the plant as well as the plant itself -- are impossible to obtain.

Even as Desert Rock’s developers have struggled with permits and tax breaks, electricity markets have changed significantly. Initially, developers looked to California. But after that state’s Public Utility Commission essentially banned new contracts for electricity from coal-fired power plants in early 2007 -- requiring utilities to generate or purchase power with emissions comparable to or lower than modern natural gas facilities, which emit about half the carbon emissions of coal -- developers turned to the interior Southwest. In Desert Rock’s June 2007 draft environmental impact statement, Sithe listed seven of the region’s utilities, all of which were projected to need new power, as potential customers.

Now, however, not one of those utilities plans to seek electricity from new coal plants. Although he’s optimistic about the future of “clean coal” and the eventual development of new carbon-capturing technology, Resource Planning Manager John Coggins of the Salt River Project sums up the utilities’ current viewpoint: Until it’s certain how carbon emissions will be regulated and there’s a commercially viable way to capture and store carbon, the Salt River Project, which serves the Phoenix area, has no intention of buying new coal power. In addition to the EPA’s recent ruling that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases should be considered pollutants, the agency has proposed new air-quality standards for smog, which, if implemented, will affect everything from the transportation sector to factories and power plants.

Securing funds for the ever-more-expensive Desert Rock, even from the Navajo Nation itself, has also proved difficult for Sithe. In 2003, when the project was projected to cost $1.5 billion, the Nation was expected to pay between 25 and 49 percent of construction costs. Now, with estimated costs exceeding $4 billion, President Shirley’s spokesman, George Hardeen, says that Sithe will have to foot the entire bill. In fact, the tribal council has yet to actually approve investment in the project. Within the agreement that the Diné Power Authority drew up between Sithe and the tribe, DPA’s project administrator Ben Hoisington says the Navajo Nation still has the option to buy into Desert Rock and be a partner in the project. The DPA is working with the tribal council’s oversight committee and investment committee on the deal. “We are just trying to fine-tune it,” he adds. “But we have to get the permitting done before we can make any commitments.”

The tribe and Sithe have also failed to obtain federal money. In 2005, the Bush administration denied Shirley’s request for a $1 billion loan; three years later, the Obama-Biden Transition Team denied a $2.9 billion request to help fund carbon capture and sequestration at the site. A June 2009 application to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Clean Coal Power Initiative was also denied.

Some tribal officials -- including CERT’s Lester and DPA’s Hoisington -- say the federal government is unfairly denying Indian projects. But there are significant discrepancies between the reality of the project and the words in the clean-power initiative application. Sithe insists, for example, that the project is supported by the host community as well as the Navajo tribal government -- and that the project is in “very advanced stages of development,” despite lacking all of its permits.

This isn’t the first time the Navajo Nation has stumbled while trying to develop its own energy resources. Since it was founded in 1985, the Diné Power Authority has yet to develop a single energy project. Even the project that spurred the authority’s creation in the mid-1980s -- the Paragon Ranch coal-fired plant planned for reservation land north of Crownpoint -- never came to fruition. “In ‘92, things went toward natural gas,” says Hoisington, “and the plant was not feasible.” At that point, the authority directed its efforts toward the Navajo Transmission Project, which would run from the reservation in northwestern New Mexico some 400 miles to Nevada. But more than two decades into the project’s planning process, it also remains theoretical.

In March, 2009, the Department of the Interior remanded the power line’s environmental impact statement after environmental groups sued, arguing that the analysis -- completed in 1996 -- did not consider the greenhouse gas emissions or the environmental and health impacts from the coal plant it would likely serve: Desert Rock. On top of that, the project’s only permit, for a segment of the line’s location Arizona, will expire this October.

In the past, some Navajo Council delegates have complained about the authority’s lack of results. In response, in 2003, the tribe’s Office of Management and Budget prepared a report, questioning the authority’s funding and its timelines for projects. Between 1990 and 2003, it found, the tribe had given DPA $9,373,381 “for the transmission project with no return to the nation.” Diné CARE’s Goodman estimates that the tribal council has allocated $20 million to the authority since 1990. OMB executive director Dominic Beyal agrees that Goodman is close.

According to Hoisington, DPA has a staff of eight, and its budget goes mostly toward travel. “With delays in the (power plant) project, we have to have meetings not only regionally, but on a national level,” he says. “We do a lot of presentations ... and we have to use consultants to help us move forward with the project, legally, environmentally and engineering-wise.”

He also says that the power authority has put some of the $20 million toward the transmission line’s Environmental Impact Statement and “other studies” to determine which route would have the least impact. But those studies would have been paid for by the developers funding the projects, including Trans-Elect, an early investor in the transmission line, and Sithe. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to say definitively how DPA has spent its money: Tribal governments are not obligated to comply with open-records laws.

Through most of the challenges, President Shirley’s office has firmly maintained that Desert Rock is still a go, and Sithe and its public relations team have agreed. But early this year, the company pulled back from plans for two of its three coal-fired power proposals in the United States. In February, it abandoned a 300-megawatt waste-coal plant in Pennsylvania. In March, it transformed plans for its Toquop Energy Project near Mesquite, Nev., into a 700-megawatt natural gas plant with a 100-megawatt solar component.

Shortly after, Sithe Executive Vice President Dirk Straussfeld admitted that the company is also actively reviewing Desert Rock to take into account economic and regulatory changes. The company is in discussion with utilities to learn what types of power resources they are seeking for the future: Desert Rock can only go forward if it has customers. Essentially, everything is on the table, he says, including perhaps the plant’s design. “There is no need in 2015 for this, so it might be delayed,” Straussfeld says, adding that Sithe has no plans to resubmit its air-permit application to the EPA.

Shirley has insisted the tribe will find a new company if Sithe balks. “Desert Rock is still on track,” says presidential spokesman George Hardeen. “It’s going to provide jobs that are needed on Navajo -- people are getting poorer, and Navajos want jobs.”

But it’s clear the tribal government is becoming increasingly desperate. For years, in response to environmentalists’ lawsuit over the Navajo transmission line’s environmental analysis, the tribe and project proponents claimed that the line and Desert Rock were two separate endeavors. Now, however, they say that building Desert Rock and the transmission line together is the only way the tribe can develop and market its renewable energy resources.

“The Desert Rock power plant is a keystone to building the capacity for tribal energy to be developed in a win-win scenario,” says CERT’s Lester. It’s the lack of transmission that thwarts full development of renewable resources on the Navajo, Hopi and Hualapai reservations, he says. The nation is dotted with orphaned wind-farm proposals -- only a large-scale coal or natural gas plants can justify something as expensive as a 500-kilovolt line. “If we want the vast solar resources of the Colorado Plateau to be developed, we’ve got to have a transmission line,” he says. “And Desert Rock would provide that transmission line.”

Even if Lester is right, Desert Rock as coal plant looks to be on its deathbed. Its biggest proponent is on his way out of power. In July, Shirley lost a court bid to throw out term limits so he could run again this fall. And though the project probably won’t be a major issue in the election, neither candidate vying to replace Shirley overtly supports Desert Rock in its current form. The Navajo primary winner, state Sen. Lynda Lovejoy, says Sithe needs to deal with local concerns about how the 1,500 megawatt plant would deplete water supplies and affect air quality. The company also needs to commit to employing Navajos and training them to take on administrative and managerial jobs, she adds, and to the long-term well-being of the tribe. Although she suggests that a smaller megawatt plant might be a better fit for the tribe, Lovejoy says she’d most like to see the company agree to give more financial control over and more financial return from the project to the Navajo. But with no commitment from the tribal council to actually invest in the plant’s construction, that seems unrealistic.

For his part, Lovejoy’s opponent, current Navajo Vice President Ben Shelly, actively opposes Desert Rock and has called the project “foolish.” “There is no hope of getting that particular power plant going under President Obama,” he says. Throw in roadblocks from the EPA and other federal agencies, as well as the state’s staunch opposition, he adds, and “there is no hope that we know of that it will be built.” In other words, says Shelly, it’s time to move on. “By saying no to Desert Rock,” he says, “maybe we can focus on other sources of power.”

Source: hcn-thelifeanddeathofdesertrock

Durango Telegraph: The Death of Desert Rock?

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 15:12:46 -0600

The death of Desert Rock?
Coal-fired power proposal suffers another setback

A Navajo woman herds her sheep along a utility corridor not far from where the
Desert Rock Power Plant was proposed to be built. Desert Rock lost its funding
source recently, and it now looks unlikely that the controversial power plant will
ever be built./ Telegraph file photo

by Will Sands

The air is rapidly clearing over the Four Corners region. The proposed Desert Rock Power Plant suffered another potentially fatal blow when its industrial revenue bonds – the mechanism for funding the plant – expired recently. While the controversial coal-fired plant’s backers are putting on brave faces, opponents are already celebrating Desert Rock’s demise.

In recent years, Sithe Global has worked to bring the 1,500-megawatt Desert Rock into existence on Navajo land just southwest of Farmington. As originally proposed, the $3.6 billion plant would have been among the largest in the nation and provide electricity for 1.5 million customers in the West’s large, urban areas. In the summer of 2008, the waning days of the Bush Administration, Desert Rock gained approval from the Environmental Protection Agency, which touted the plant as “state-of-the-art.”

However, opponents saw a great deal of smoke and mirrors in the approval. According to Sithe Global’s own estimates, Desert Rock would emit 12.7 million tons of carbon dioxide a year into the Four Corners airshed, and appeals alleged that the EPA’s permit was rushed through without a proper review.

Last fall, the Obama EPA reconsidered the plant’s “state-of-the-art” status and officially revoked the permit citing numerous deficiencies in the analysis. Two months later, Desert Rock slammed into another roadblock when the Department of Energy denied a Desert Rock application for $451 million in stimulus funding. The taxpayer dollars would have gone to adding a carbon-capture component to the proposed plant. Despite these setbacks, Sithe pledged to “explore possibilities” and “leave everything on the table.”

However, Desert Rock may be breathing its final gasp. Funding for the massive power plant officially dried up a few weeks ago. San Juan County had issued $3.2 in tax-free industrial revenue bonds to fund Desert after a request from Sithe Global in

2007. But the fine-print required that Desert Rock have an EPA permit in order for the bonds to be valid. After last fall’s revocation of the permit and a deadline in late June, the bonds have expired. Nonetheless, Sithe Global remains optimistic. Keeping his comments to the point, Dirk Straussfeld, Sithe’s executive vice-president, said, “We are reviewing the options for this project to take into account the energy market and the changed permitting environment.”

Conservationists, on the other hand, charge that Desert Rock has officially run out of options. “There aren’t any upsides for Desert Rock anymore,” said Mike Eisenfeld, of San Juan Citizens Alliance. “There aren’t customers for Desert Rock power. There’s no transmission in place. And now there’s no funding. The bottom line is no permits, no project.”

In addition, Desert Rock’s political foundation is on the verge of evaporating. The plant has always been proposed in conjunction with the Navajo Nation and has long been a pet project of Navajo President Joe Shirley, Jr. However, Shirley’s term is nearly up, and both of the frontrunners for the presidency are decidedly anti-Desert Rock. Candidate Ben Shelly, who is Shirley’s vice-president, is adamantly opposed to Desert Rock and has plainly said that the plant is “not going to happen.”

Linda Lovejoy, Shelly’s rival and a New Mexico state senator, recently indicated her aversion to the plant in her choice of a running mate. Lovejoy will be joined on the ticket by Earl Tulley, a Navajo conservationist who served on the board for one of Desert Rock’s chief rivals – Diné CARE, a Navajo environmental organization.

“Desert Rock is dead,” said Lori Goodman, treasurer for Diné CARE, “and everyone on the Navajo Nation believes the power plant is dead, except for Joe Shirley. People are aware of the health impacts of coal-fired power, and it’s time for a new era in the Four Corners.”

In this spirit, Goodman joined dozens of other Navajo activists and politicians at a conference in the Navajo capital, Window Rock, Ariz., last weekend. The goal of the gathering was to spotlight and advocate large solar and wind projects on the Navajo Nation. “We’re looking at ways to mobilize the people, begin work on renewable projects and do it in a timely manner,” Goodman said.

The Four Corners’ abundant solar and wind resources and vast expanses of untapped acreage make the region an ideal candidate for large renewable energy projects, according to Eisenfeld. These assets coupled with strong momentum away from coal-fired power can only lead in one direction.

“It’s time for the electric and power industries to start realizing and reflecting the real costs of coal-fired power,” Eisenfeld said. “We hope our region can be on the forefront of developing renewable energy projects that can have both economic and environmental benefits.”

The Navajo Nation is already charged up for this new direction, according to Goodman, who added that Desert Rock has already been forgotten. “This is a good time on the Navajo Nation, and we’re all excited about the future,” she said. “Desert Rock is dead.” •

SideStory: The next targets

The clean-air crosshairs are now moving away from Desert Rock and toward two of the region’s and the nation’s biggest polluters. The push is now on for retrofits and cuts in emissions at the Four Corners Power Plant and San Juan Generating Station.

Both of the plants, located just west of Farmington, are under pressure from the Environmental Protection Agency to consider “best available retrofit technology.” Though costly, the upgrades would greatly reduce emissions from the Four Corners Power Plant – the largest emitter of nitrogen oxide in the country – and the San Juan Generating Station – New Mexico’s second largest source of greenhouse gases.

The New Mexico Environment Department is on the verge of renewing the San Juan’s operating permit. However, numerous watchdog groups are objecting on the grounds that carbon dioxide emissions from the 1,600-megawatt plant are not being regulated. In addition, the plant’s CO2 emissions jumped from 11.8 million tons to more than 13.3 million tons between 2008-09, a time when the plant was supposed to be cutting back.

“We’re shifting gears now and looking at the existing plants in the region,” said Mike Eisenfeld, of San Juan Citizens Alliance. “This is one of the first opportunities we have to clean up these older coal-fired power plants that have escaped pollution controls all these years.”

– Will Sands

Source: tn-thedeathofdesertrock

Is Desert Rock Another Empty Promise?

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 06 May 2010 15:43:15 -0600

Letter appearing in The Navajo Times, May 6, 2010:

Is Desert Rock another empty promise?

Increasing jobs has always been a challenge for the Navajo Nation president and council delegates, but at what cost will these jobs come? Will we keep accepting any project that comes our way, even if it harms the physical, mental, spiritual and environmental health of our people and our land?

President Joe Shirley, his spokesman George Hardeen, Diné Power Authority's Steven Begay, and Sithe Global representatives Dirk Straussfeld and Frank Maisano have been telling the Navajo people for years how another coal-fired power plant, Desert Rock, will bring jobs and sovereignty to us. Let's first take a look at history. How many times have the government and energy companies made promises to us?

In the 1940s, just like today, our people needed jobs. The big "opportunity" at that time was uranium mining. Hundreds of Navajo men went to work in uranium mines. They were not given the proper safety gear, much less told of the dangers of radiation exposure from uranium ore.

The federal government and mining companies were aware of the dangers, but they decided following safety regulations was too expensive. Instead they studied how long it took for a human being to develop breathing problems, cancer, and then how long they lived. It was not until the 1990s when the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed that some, not all, families received monetary compensation.

Then there is Peabody Coal Company, which arrived in the 1960s. They told us we would be rolling in money. As a result of the mineral and water leases signed by the Navajo and Hopi tribal governments, our female deity (Dzil Yijiin) has been sacrificed for a few pennies.

What's more, we have allowed Peabody to take 267,240 acre-feet of water from the Navajo Aquifer that our people need for their livelihood. The current royalty rate, which is supposed to compensate for all this damage, is a mere 12.5 percent, the lowest possible rate allowable by the 1985 Indian Minerals Leasing Act.

But in the end, all the money in the world cannot compensate for the loss of culture, clean environment and the forced relocation of 12,000 of our relatives from Black Mesa.

These are just two examples of empty promises that were made to the Navajo people. Oil and gas issues are the same, as well as logging that went on for over 100 years to the Chuska Mountains (Ch'oshgai) our male deity.

After one realizes the overall picture happening to Navajo people (and to all indigenous people throughout the world) it would seem that allowing energy companies to come into our land, dirty up the place, push us around and then leave, is not making us an independent and sovereign nation.

What the Navajo people need is to be their own leaders and make sure that our representatives in Window Rock hear us loud and clear. President Shirley and profit-driven company reps tell us that Desert Rock is good for us, and now we are hearing that using natural gas instead of coal will make Desert Rock clean and harmless.

But we have a responsibility to keep asking hard questions about promises like this. Global warming is happening, and projects like Desert Rock are causing the heating of the earth.

We need to encourage our tribal government and DPA to develop renewable energy, so that our health and the health of our environment are not further destroyed. I know that I want clean air, water and food for myself, and for the generations to come, in a land that is not poisoned and polluted.

Robyn Jackson
Wheatfields, Ariz.

Environmental Victory?

Robyn Jackson — Sun, 02 May 2010 16:38:58 -0600

The Gallup Independent, May 1-2, 2010:

Environmental Victory?

Sithe: ‘First we need to find something that fits’ at Desert Rock

By Kathy Helms, Diné Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — Current market conditions for electricity, especially power generation from coal, along with global climate change issues could precipitate a modification in the proposed Desert Rock Energy Project.

Rumors of the demise of the 1,500 megawatt coal-fired power plant near Farmington surfaced again this week, but Dirk Straussfeld, executive vice president of co-developer Sithe Global Power, said Friday morning from Germany that Sithe has not pulled out of the project with the Navajo Nation's Diné Power Authority.

Straussfeld met recently with a number of DPA board members and told them they need to determine whether Desert Rock should be considered as some kind of different power plant so they can get something going without litigation and get everybody on board. Regional environmental groups have challenged the project at nearly every move.

"The Navajo Nation is working with Sithe on reviewing the project and potential alternatives that would meet the market needs, but I can assure you, we have not pulled out," Straussfeld said.

Economic conditions, reduced consumption of electricity and a corresponding reduction in market demand for new power generation—especially 1,500 megawatts from coal—and environmental mandates at federal and state levels are forcing many companies to rethink plans for new and existing power plants.

Southern California Edison recently informed Arizona Public Service it will divest its 48 percent share of Four Corners Power Plant by 2016 because of sweeping greenhouse gas regulations enacted by California will prohibit SCE from buying power produced from coal.

Four Corners provides about $65 million annually to the Navajo Nation in taxes, fees and royalties. The Nation expects to receive about $52 million annually from Desert Rock if it is built as a coal plant.

Straussfeld said Sithe is "committed to work with the tribe on realizing a power project at Desert Rock. If we find an alternative that fits in the market, we will work with the tribe and be a part of this development, but first we need to find something that fits in the market.

"We look at coal, we look at solar, we look at pretty much everything—various combinations of fossil and renewable," he said. "Desert Rock could change its form, but no decision has been made," he added. "If there is a change in plan, that decision is expected by summer."

In March, it was announced that Sithe had abandoned the idea of building a 750-megawatt supercritical pulverized coal plant near the Toquop Indian Reservation in Nevada. A more environmentally friendly, 700 megawatt natural gas-fired electrical generation plant combined with a 100 megawatt solar-powered plant will be built instead.

Stephen Begay, DPA general manager, confirmed there are internal discussions and talks with Navajo Nation officials about potential changes to Desert Rock.

Difficulty in obtaining carbon-capture funding from the federal government for a pilot project at Desert Rock is just one of many factors. Begay said that since Desert Rock is comprised of two 750-megawatt units, it might be easier to obtain funding for carbon capture on one unit.

"Maybe we start there and the second unit would kind of be open. We're not saying that's what's going to happen, but I think we're looking at the options. Initially, I think we need to look at carbon capture as a pilot project at Desert Rock and then work toward commercial scale application at the plant. That would be the way we would want to proceed," he said.

"We're still on track to do what we can with Desert Rock as an ultra-supercritical power plant, but given the changes in energy demand and some of the concerns of off-take for coal power versus off-take for renewable power, we have to consider those factors in our discussion with the Nation."

While DPA is open to considering the options of a modified version of Desert Rock, Begay said, "I think the key is the economics and the use of Navajo resources to kind of support its own sustenance."

Meanwhile, Elouise. Brown, president of Dooda Desert Rock, one of the grassroots groups opposed to the coal plant, returned this week from Cochabamba, Bolivia, where she attended the World People's Conference on Climate Change.

"People have been asking me what a Navajo grassroots group is doing at a world climate conference in Bolivia. The simple answer is that we need to carry our campaign to wherever we can focus attention on the facts."

Brown said the major fact is that no one is addressing is the findings of studies of air quality in the Shiprock area where Desert Rock would be located. Those studies showed that Navajos living downwind of the two existing power plants must seek medical attention at high rates.

"We raised the issue that the proposed Desert Rock power plant violates the provisions of Diné Natural Law in the Fundamental Laws of the Diné. ... Area energy companies spent a lot of money to negate Mother Earth's rights, and I went to Bolivia to make them stronger," she said.

Brown also forged new alliances, to make it possible for Dooda Desert Rock to have a presence in the development of international law and policy, she said. "I will be sitting next to the Navajo Nation delegates in Geneva to tell the United Nations how the Nation is violating the rights of Mother Earth."

Durango Herald: Ozone Levels Pressure Four Corners

Robyn Jackson — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 15:54:37 -0600

Ozone levels pressure Four Corners

Environmental Protection Agency proposes stricter air standards

by Katie Burford

Herald Staff Writer
Article Last Updated; Sunday, April 25, 2010

The Four Corners - along with most of the western United States - could fall out of attainment of federal ozone limits under new standards being considered by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The agency is proposing to tighten its "primary" ozone standard from 75 parts per billion to a level within the range of 60 ppb and 70 ppb.

The stricter standard is based on findings about the health effects of ozone, particularly on the elderly, children and people with respiratory problems.

"Children are at increased risk from exposure to ozone because their lungs are still developing and they are more likely to be active outdoors," an EPA fact sheet about the proposed standard says.

An air-quality report commissioned by La Plata County notes that most monitoring sites in the area have recorded levels at or above the proposed levels.

"Most, if not all, of monitoring sites in the Four Corners Region currently would be in violation of the new ozone NAAQS (national ambient air quality standards)," the report states.

John Molenar, who wrote the report and is an air-quality expert with Fort Collins-based Air Resource Specialists, said the lion's share of ozone-producing emissions in the region come from energy production, including natural-gas wells and two large-scale coal-fired power plants near Farmington.

Thousands of wells dot the northern San Juan Basin, a rich source of coal-bed methane. Meanwhile, the Four Corners Power Plant is one of the largest coal-fired generating stations in the U.S., and the San Juan Generating Station is the seventh largest in the West.

A third coal-fired plant, Desert Rock, has been proposed for the region but has struggled to obtain necessary regulatory approvals.

Vehicles and many other human activities also contribute.

The EPA is expected to announce its final decision about the standard in late summer. It will be the second time in about two years that the agency has imposed a more stringent limit.

In March 2008, the limit was moved from 84 ppb to the current level of 75 ppb despite a recommendation from the EPA's independent scientific advisory panel that it be lower still.

The Obama administration called for a new review, which led to the current proposal for tighter limits, said Mike Silverstein, deputy director of the Air Pollution Control Division at the state health department.

Silverstein said being classified as out of attainment is a "big deal" because it requires affected areas to come up with detailed plans for reducing emissions related to ozone.

Some of the remedies, such as retrofitting power plants with advanced emissions controls, can be costly.

"We have to figure out, strategically, where do we get the most bang for our buck," Silverstein said.

Molenar said ozone is the product of a complex interaction of factors, including climatology and geography. Some areas have naturally high ozone levels.

"It's not a linear thing," he said.

That can make solving the problem tricky.

The cost of either producing cleaner power or curtailing production will get passed on to consumers in the form of more expensive energy or fewer jobs.

"The bottom line is, we're going to pay for it," Molenar said.

And the most effectual measures, such as shutting down the coal-fired power plants, may be economically untenable.

Because of this, he said his personal opinion is that expectations for improvement must be reasonable.

"The best we're going to do anywhere in these oil- and gas-producing areas is maintain where we're at," he said. "I'm not sure it will ever come down."

Source: dh-ozonelevelspressurefourcorners

Time for Desert Rock Supporters to Move On

Robyn Jackson — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 15:57:05 -0600

Editorial, The Farmington Daily Times, April 19, 2010:

Time for Desert Rock Supporters to Move On

It seemed like it was doomed from the start.

In 2006, early work at the planned site of the coal-fired Desert Rock Power Plant brought out protestors from the nearby community of Burnham. Despite the added jobs the plant would bring to help reduce the Navajo Nation's stifling unemployment rate, these protestors did not want another coal power plant in the region polluting the skies.

Even back then, with a Republican president in office who supported coal power, it seemed doubtful that the plant would ever get built.

Now, it appears the coffin is finally getting nailed shut.

This was the year Desert Rock was supposed to begin operation, but instead they do not have an air permit from the federal government, and the company's planned operator, Houston-based Sithe Global, is pulling out of the coal marketplace. They've already shuttered plans for another coal plant in Pennsylvania, and converted plans for another in Nevada to natural gas plant.

Despite these monumental difficulties, the Navajo Nation government continues to show nothing less than complete support for the Desert Rock project, and it's difficult to understand why. No one gains anything by stretching out the Desert Rock saga, least of all the Navajo people who were going to be employed at the power plant.

Navajo leaders must be proactive on this matter if they want to be faithful to their constituents. Sithe Global has stated it wants to build a power plant on Navajo land, but coal continues

to run into opposition. Maybe it's time to shake that plan up a bit.

A natural gas plant would take advantage of our local abundance of the substance, as well as give off significantly less emissions than coal. In that situation, everyone wins: local natural gas companies, unemployed Navajo and the environment.

There also are possibilities in the areas of renewable energy such as solar and wind, which give off no pollution. Was there ever a plan B in the cards regarding Desert Rock?

If so, now would be a good time reveal it.

Desert Rock Goes Back to Drawing Board

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 16:09:09 -0600

Desert Rock goes back to drawing board

By Megan Graham
San Juan Citizens Alliance
Durango Herald
Article Last Updated; Thursday, April 15, 2010 12:00AM

For more than six years, proponents of the Desert Rock Energy Project have been hard at work trying to convince the world that building a 1,500-megawatt coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation is a good idea.

Time and again, these efforts have not produced the results that Sithe Global and its supporters had hoped for, and it appears that the company may finally be seeing the writing on the wall.

In a High Country News article last month, Dirk Straussfeld, Sithe's executive vice president, said that the company is going back to square one on its plans for the facility, reviewing whether and how to proceed. Given the regulatory, economic and public opinion setbacks that the proposed facility has faced, this is a long overdue recognition of reality. It is nonetheless cause for cautious optimism that a third coal-fired power plant in the Four Corners region might not be the sealed fate it was once thought to be.

Tacky as it may be to celebrate at a funeral, seeing a poorly conceived project go the way of the wind is something over which all of us who live in this area can share a collective high-five. As it was proposed, Desert Rock, which would have brought much-needed jobs to the Navajo Nation and was therefore supported by the tribal government, was fraught with problems that would have had significant impacts on public health and the environment, all while contributing to global climate change.

A broad-based coalition of tribal groups, state, regional and federal lawmakers and conservation organizations amassed a body of evidence outlining all that was wrong with the power-plant proposal and the process through which it had advanced. The Environmental Protection Agency remanded the facility's air permit in 2009, investors began questioning the wisdom of throwing money behind more coal-derived energy, and the federal government denied proponents' application for funding to experiment with unproven carbon capture and carbon sequestration technology at the facility. Nevertheless, Sithe persisted in its efforts.

Until now. Sithe is apparently putting all options into the mix for consideration of next steps - including whether the project it proposes will even be a coal-fired facility. Implicit in this decision is the realization that public utilities - entities that Desert Rock owners would rely on to purchase the power generated at the plant - are moving away from coal-generated power.

That recognition, and the return to the drawing board that it prompted, gives those of us who would like to see a comprehensive shift in how and where our energy is derived an opportunity to help reshape Desert Rock as a project that will meet the three-pronged test: to provide power, to serve as an economic engine for the Navajo Nation and to not harm public health and the environment in the process.

Clean, renewable energy is the way forward in that effort, and Sithe can be a leader in that transformation. Here's hoping the company is up to the challenge.

meg@sanjuancitizens.org Megan Graham is director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance.

Source: Desert Rock Goes Back to Drawing Board

Navajo activist declares power plant project ‘dead’

Robyn Jackson — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 06:21:31 -0600

Navajo activist declares power plant project ‘dead’

By Shadi Rahimi, Today correspondent

Story Published: Apr 9, 2010

Story Updated: Apr 2, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. – Elouise Brown is on a speaking tour across the state, visiting a dozen communities to tell the story of her battle against a coal-burning power plant proposal near her home in Chaco Rio, N.M.

Photo courtesy Shadi Rahimi

Elouise Brown spoke at the Women’s Building in San Francisco March 20.

“I don’t care what anyone says – the project is dead. It’s not going to happen as long as I live.”

It’s been three years since Brown launched a stand off against her tribe, the Navajo Nation, to stop it from building a 1,500-megawatt project called Desert Rock on land allotted to her family by the tribal government. Last April, the Environmental Protection Agency withdrew the air quality permit it had issued, which its opponents declared a victory.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. said the decision doesn’t mean the project is cancelled. He said his government is continuing efforts to obtain permits.

Meanwhile, Brown is being celebrated in activist circles, particularly in California, where environmental and sacred site battles are at the forefront of Native activism.

Brown’s battle began Dec. 11, 2006 after her parents discovered a drilling site near her home. “There was a well head, trash and a rental generator down a little ditch. Our cattle gates were left open and south of the site we found orange survey flags.”

Two aging coal-burning plants, the Four Corners Power Plant and the San Juan Generating Station, were already operating within a 20-mile radius of Brown’s home. Together they belch more than half the state’s annual 57 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Brown vowed, “Another plant will not be built here.”

She had no legal means to stop construction because there is no private land ownership in Navajoland. When a contractor returned, Brown argued with him until he left. She then built a fire. Her family helped set up a makeshift blockade with a white tent and Brown called on her community to help.

Some came, but she also found opposition from her people. The windows of her truck and solar-powered home were smashed and her resistance camp, “Dooda (No) Desert Rock,” was moved twice – once forcibly by tribal police and once by Brown after it was trashed and a table was burnt.

Her main adversaries are more powerful: The Navajo’s utility company proposed the power plant; Texas developers Sithe Global Power and Fluor Corporation plan to spend $3 billion to build and operate it; and Navajo legislators support a project that promises to bring 3,000 temporary and 400 permanent jobs to a reservation where half the population is unemployed.

The project is expected to bring $50 million a year in taxes, coal royalties and other payments to fund almost one-third of the Navajo Nation’s annual operating budget, Shirley said.

“Desert Rock remains the most important economic development project in our Nation’s history,” he said. “It is a key to our saving self, to ending our dependence on the federal government, and to regaining our independence.”

Energy is hotly debated in Navajoland, which extends across swaths of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah and has 20 billion tons of coal beneath it, one of the continent’s largest deposits. During his two terms, Shirley has welcomed outsiders eager to excavate the energy-rich land to lift his people out of poverty.

Even so, Desert Rock has been a hard sell in parts of the 26,600-square-mile reservation, where the history of tribal rule is rooted in federal meddling, and traditionalists have long pushed for a return to harmony with the terrain tended by goat and sheepherders, ranchers, farmers and grandmothers revered as matriarchs.

“There’s so much potential here yet we’re still grasping for the old post-industrial pollutants,” said Shonto Begay. “The old stories talk of monsters and obstacles coming to annihilate us. Now we’re back battling those monsters, rearing their ugly heads, making the whole area a toxic stew. In this way we can’t have ‘hozhó,’ which in Navajo means beauty, harmony, everything calm, serene and right.”

Desert Rock opponents often mention hozhó. It even appeared in a report by the nonprofit Environmental Council of the States, which outlined the likelihood of hazards and pollution from Desert Rock. The “environmental wounds and historical trauma incurred from extractive mining industry as a result of an imposed western energy paradigm,” must be counterbalanced with sustainable technologies.

Brown’s opposition has taken shape as editorials, petitions circulated among the 250,000 Navajo tribal members, and lobbying of the state legislature against an $85 million state tax break for Desert Rock.

She quit her job to lobby, sleeping in her car and visiting every legislator “until they were all tired of me.”

They began to recognize her Pendleton jacket, so she would stalk the hallways and wave. If they waved back, they understood her position. If they didn’t, she would approach them. When a chronic illness left her temporarily paralyzed before the vote, her elderly mother helped her walk so she could wave, she said.

“Only two people didn’t wave back.”

She emerged victorious: the tax break was defeated. Gov. Bill Richardson visited her camp and slammed Desert Rock, saying it would “adversely impact air quality, exacerbate existing environment problems, and negatively impact scarce surface and groundwater resources.” Opponents sent thousands of letters against the air quality permit the EPA would withdraw.

Assistant New Mexico Attorney General Seth Cohen has called the withdrawal a huge victory. At the same time, Cohen said the state will work with the Navajo Nation to redraft the permit in response to pollution concerns, environmental impacts and the lack of new emission control technologies.

But Brown isn’t worried. By the time the permit comes up again, she said, coal-burning power plants will be nearly obsolete.

“This story is not about me. This is about if you want to do anything, you can get it done. We killed this power plant with faith, persistence and resistance.”

Original story: http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/national/southwest/89789732.html

SoCal Edison Bails Out of Coal Plant

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 16:02:07 -0600

SoCal Edison Bails Out of Coal Plant

New America Media, News Report , Ngoc Nguyen, Posted: Apr 07, 2010

Even as Pres. Obama is touting coal as part of a clean energy future, one of the largest utilities in California is trying to distance itself from the fossil fuel.

Southern California Edison (SCE), a subsidiary of Edison International, intends to divest its 48 percent share of Four Corners Power Plant by the end of 2016. Located west of Farmington, New Mexico, on the Navajo Nation reservation, the power plant represents SCE’s last remaining stake in a coal-fired power plant.

In a March 1 financial disclosure to federal regulators, the company indicated that California law prohibits it from making long-term investments in generators that emit high levels of greenhouse gases, which include most coal power plants.

“SCE thus does not expect to enter into any long-term ownership arrangements for its share of Four Corners Units 4 and 5 after the 2016 expiration of the current participant agreements due to the investment constraints of SB 1368,” the company said in the report.

“California law prohibits certain future investments in plants such as Four Corners,” said SCE spokesperson Gil Alexander. “We do not intend to be a partner at the Four Corners plant beyond the current contract.”

Southern California Edison isn’t the only one. Los Aangeles Department of Water, which gets 44 percent of its electricity from coal, announced in October 2009 it would eliminate the purchase of coal power in the next 10 years. The trend shows utilities are increasingly seeing coal as a bad business decision.

“It’s a sign that SCE is conscious of the cost of keeping coal in its portfolio,” said John White, executive director of the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technology, based in Sacramento. “There is a myth that coal is cheap, compared to other sources of electricity, but the problem is it doesn’t count a lot of the costs that coal imposes on communities. Now, the bill is coming due.”

Four Corners is a 2,040-megawatt power plant made up of five units. Arizona Public Service is the sole owner of units one, two and three. Southern California Edison co-owns units four and five, which generate 1,500 megawatts, with Arizona Public Service and three other utilities.

The need to install pollution controls to comply with federal rules, the problem of coal ash, mine safety, and the looming threat of climate change are weighing heavyily on bottom lines and clouding the future of coal power.

“SCE has informed the plant that it does plan to divest of its ownership share no later than 2016,” said Arizona Public Service spokesperson Damon Gross. “As far as an owner stepping in, it’s too early to say because there’s a lot of moving parts.”

That includes, he said, increasing efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions by the federal government and states, and a host of environmental regulations pertaining to air, water and hazardous waste.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency has proposed air pollution controls for Four Corners power plant costing $900 million.

In its 10K financial disclosure to the Security and Exchange Commission, SCE said California law may prohibit it from making costly capital investments: “SB 1368 may prohibit SCE from making emission control expenditures at Four Corners.”

Gross said SCE’s decision to divest of its ownership share and the proposed EPA pollution retrofits are posing “serious challenges” for the power plant. He said Four Corners plays a significant role in the community.

Arizona Public Service met with members of the Navajo Nation government last week to discuss the future of the Four Corners Power Plant. Both the Navajo coal mine and the power plant employ 1,050 workers, of which about 75 percent are Native Americans.

The transition from traditional sources of energy to renewable sources will shed jobs, but it also has the potential to create the “next generation of jobs,” says Monique Lopez, campaign associate with the Coalition for Clean Air, a statewide advocacy and policy group.

There’s also a perception that the switch to renewables will lead to higher energy costs, but Lopez says in the long run, coal power will cost more.

“Moving away from those sources and moving to renewable energy will not only benefit those communities, but benefit those communities receiving that energy in the long run, because of pending carbon regulations that are coming down the pipelines which will make those types of sources more expensive for consumers.”

Consumers will also see savings on their utility bills with stepped up efforts to boost energy efficiency, and says that’s the direction utilities need to take.

Source: http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=3480c726d8ab017c566b0c02acb012ad

Black Mesa 'Reopener' Must Be Renegotiated

Robyn Jackson — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 15:53:50 -0600

By Kathy Helms

Diné Bureau

Gallup Independent

April 5, 2010

WINDOW ROCK – The Navajo Nation Council spent nearly an entire day last week discussing the 10-year coal royalty rate “reopener” with Peabody Western Coal Co. for Black Mesa leases before it was determined that the deal is dead because the resolution was tabled by Council in December and an attempt to bring it back failed.

“Right now, we don't have a deal between the Navajo Nation and Peabody, with the exception that they will continue digging coal and if there is any revenue to be generated, it would basically be at the 12.5 percent royalty rate, period,” said Resources Committee Chairman George Arthur, sponsor of the resolution.

The bill came before Council the first week of November 2009 but was tabled with a directive that a work session be held within 30 days. The work session was held Dec. 21 and the resolution was tabled again Dec. 22 during a special session.

Another directive was made at that time to hold a work session within 90 days to review all leases since 1960 pertaining to Peabody and to possibly hold public hearings before presenting oral and written reports during spring session. Council has yet to see the leases and the public hearings haven't been held.

Approval of the “reopener” amendment would give the Nation 12.5 percent coal royalties until 2017 – the minimum set by Congress in 1977 – a signing bonus of $1.55 million for both leases, an annual bonus of $3.5 million a year for 10 years, and scholarship funding of $250,000, up from $186,000.

Peabody has operated the Kayenta and Black Mesa mines as two separate surface coal mining operations since the early 1970s. The Kayenta mining operation has supplied coal to Navajo Generating Station near Page since 1973, while Black Mesa supplied coal to Mohave Generating Station near Laughlin, Nev., from 1970 until December 2005.

Mohave and the Black Mesa mine closed in 2005 after utility company owners, led by Southern California Edison, could not reach agreement with the Navajo and Hopi tribes on coal and water supplies for the generating station.

Navajo gets full royalty of 12.5 percent under Lease 8580, which provides coal to Navajo Generating Station; both tribes get 6.25 percent each under Lease 9910, in the former Joint Use Area, which primarily provided coal to Mohave.

“The reopener, at the moment, is gone unless we agree to go back and renegotiate and reestablish an understanding that there is an agreement between the Navajo Nation and Peabody,” Arthur said, but added that the deal might not be the same.

Attorney General Louis Denetsosie said the consequences of not approving the 2007 royalty adjustment is the Navajo Nation would lose the $36.5 million that has been negotiated, compared to the $32.5 million negotiated in 1997.

“We have received $3.5 million already and we would have to return the $3.5 million to Peabody,” he said.

Britt Clapham, former deputy attorney general for the Navajo Nation who has been involved in reopener negotiations, told Council that rejecting the royalty rate adjustment has no impact on Peabody's operation. The company can continue to mine coal under its leases with the Navajo Nation until the coal runs out, whether Navajo approves the rate adjustment or not.

“The reopeners are relatively narrow. They are to adjust the royalty rate only if either party is dissatisfied. We have exercised that option in 1997-98 and again in 2007-2008. The question you have before you is to approve the revised royalty rate.

“The 10-year reopener does not reopen every aspect of the lease agreement. It merely reopens the royalty rate. That's what we can negotiate about. If the federal minimum increased, we would automatically go to that,” Clapham said, however, that has not come into play since the rate was set in 1977.

“The Navajo Nation can't give away under a Black Mesa lease what an administrative law judge vacated in a permit,” said Marsha Monestersky, program director for the Forgotten People. “They can't do anything with the Black Mesa lease. There is no Black Mesa Mine.”

An administrative law judge vacated a life-of-mine permit for the Black Mesa Complex in January, ruling that the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement violated the National Environmental Policy Act, and remanded the permit to OSM for further action.

“All there is, is the Kayenta Mine, because what the judge vacated was actually the Black Mesa Complex. They were going to fold the Kayenta and the Black Mesa mines together in the Black Mesa Complex,” Monestersky said, adding that the Navajo Nation was trying to do in the lease reopener what couldn't be done in the vacated permit.

“You can't issue a permit or a lease for a mine that doesn't exist. If there's only one mine, why would they have two leases? They're running out of good coal. There's no permit for Black Mesa Mine and OSM didn't respond and file an appeal in a timely manner, so if they want to reopen the Black Mesa Mine, they have to issue a whole new Environmental Impact Statement,” she said.

Forgotten People has vowed to file suit, based on the same grounds, against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency if it issues a wastewater discharge permit for the Black Mesa/Kayenta mines. EPA held a meeting recently in Kayenta to discuss its plan to issue the wastewater permit.

AP reporter says Navajo Nation Stands By Power Plant Despite Snags

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 21:08:46 -0600

Navajo Nation stands by power plant despite snags

04/02/2010

By FELICIA FONSECA / Associated Press

The challenges facing a proposed coal-fired power plant on the country's largest Indian reservation are stark: the withdrawal of a key federal permit, no secured customer or transmission line, and uncertainty over the future of climate change.

The Navajo Nation acknowledges the challenges, but both the tribe and its partner in building the $3 billion, 1,500-megawatt Desert Rock Energy Project say they are committed to moving forward. Environmentalists who have fought the project contend it will be nearly impossible to do so.

"It would be a big load off the federal government's mind if Desert Rock goes away, and it will make the states happy and the environmentalists happy, and they all dance around," said Steve Begay, general manager of the tribe's Dine Power Authority. "There's a probability of it, but hopefully it's a very small probability."

The plant was scheduled to begin operating this year, with hundreds of Navajos on the employment rolls, and tax and royalty payments of $50 million a year to the financially impoverished tribe. The tribe has partnered with Houston-based Sithe Global Power on the project.

Among the major setbacks was the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's withdrawal of an air permit in September. Developers haven't resubmitted an application.

With global concerns about carbon dioxide emissions, Begay said: "It's hard to bring that together in an application."

The U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs also has withdrawn a biological assessment for the project, and the tribe was denied approval of a federal grant to help pay for equipment designed to capture carbon emissions. That's an expense Begay said would be difficult for the developer alone to take on.

Sithe Global executive vice president Dirk Straussfeld said Thursday that attitudes about coal have changed in recent years, but his company remains committed to building a power plant on the Navajo Nation.

"Sithe is still planning to move forward with Desert Rock," he said in a telephone interview.

Sithe recently abandoned another coal-fired power plant in Nevada in favor of original plans for a natural gas plant, and it halted plans for a Pennsylvania waste coal-burning plant. The moves have encouraged environmentalists who have been fighting the Desert Rock project in northwestern New Mexico.

Begay said Dine Power Authority and Sithe have had informal discussions about moving Desert Rock in a different direction, but he believes the tribe ultimately will stick up for utilizing its rich and abundant coal resources.

"The options will come later if they come," he said. "It's good for discussion and consideration. You have to have a contingency plan."

Mike Eisenfeld of the San Juan Citizens Alliance said if developers think they can come up with something better, "we'll be prepared to thoroughly analyze their proposal."

"I think they need to think about what would be successful," he said. "Why aren't they looking at a concentrated solar facility or something they could permit or that's more sustainable?"

Abbas Ghassemi, director of the Institute for Energy and the Environment at New Mexico State University, said a big issue confronting coal-fired power plants is the emissions and particulate matter.

Coal plants remain a critical part of the energy mix, but utilities increasingly are looking to renewable energy sources to meet the nation's demand.

"Everyone is aware that we can't continue to do what we do and expect someone else to clean it up," Ghassemi said. "The question then is how do we do it the most amicably so that we don't end up costing jobs and economic development at the expense of human health and environment."

LoRenzo Bates, chairman of the Navajo Nation Council's Budget and Finance Committee, said tribal lawmakers' support for Desert Rock hasn't wavered even while most of the momentum has been lost.

"Not knowing the challenges and the cost of those challenges, that's where this council has to decide," he said. "Is it worth it?"

___

Associated Press Writer Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque contributed to this report

The Death of Desert Rock?

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:18:47 -0600

The death of Desert Rock?

Sithe Global is going back to the drawing board on the proposed coal-fired power plant.

News - March 31, 2010 by Laura Paskus, High Country News

The 1,500 megawatt coal-fired Desert Rock power plant – proposed for tribal land in the Four Corners region near Farmington, N.M. -- once seemed like a slam dunk. A joint venture of the Navajo Nation and energy company Sithe Global, the plant promised the tribe much-needed jobs, along with millions in revenue and coal royalties. In 2003, when it was launched, coal's star was rising: The Bush White House refused to acknowledge the existence of climate change, and regulatory agencies were generally more permissive.

Seven years later, though, Desert Rock looks all but dead. The economy is flailing, and investors worry how future climate change legislation will affect energy development. Meanwhile, electricity demand in the Southwest is declining, and with public utilities scrambling to keep up with statewide mandates to generate more power from renewable energy sources, nobody is currently seeking new sources of coal power.

So Sithe Global, which the tribe had expected to fund the $4 billion project, is going back to the drawing board, says Sithe Executive Vice President Dirk Straussfeld. Suddenly, everything is up for review – including the plant's design as a coal facility.

From the beginning, Desert Rock's developers cited California's growing demand for electricity. But in 2007, the state's Public Utilities Commission essentially banned utilities from signing contracts for electricity from coal-fired power plants. Instead, it required them to generate or purchase power with emissions comparable to or lower than modern natural gas facilities. And not one of the six Southwestern public utilities listed in Desert Rock's 2007 environmental impact statement is planning to add new coal power to its mix.

Uncertainty is the biggest challenge facing investment in coal right now, according to energy economist Jonathan Lester. No one knows whether Congress will eventually pass a cap-and-trade program or a carbon tax or perhaps something else entirely, any of which could impact coal plants in particular, since they're among the nation's largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. In some cases, investors may balk entirely, says Lester. In others, they're likely to demand higher returns to insulate plants against potential climate costs. "Right now, they are faced with the worst of all possible worlds: They just don't know. And that kills investment."

Before backpedaling on Desert Rock in late March, Sithe Global — 80 percent of which was purchased in 2005 by the investment firm The Blackstone Group — withdrew from two other coal-fired power plants it had planned in the United States.

In February, it abandoned a proposed 300 megawatt waste-coal plant in Pennsylvania. The following month, it altered plans for the Toquop Energy Project near Mesquite, Nev., which was originally envisioned as a natural gas plant but was switched to a coal-fired power plant in 2007. Now the pendulum has swung back again: The Blackstone Group plans to invest $1.4 billion in a 700 megawatt natural gas plant with a 100 megawatt solar component at the Toquop site.

Investors weren't the only problem; Desert Rock also recently came up against significant permitting setbacks. In September 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency revoked the plant's major air-quality permit, originally granted under the Bush administration. In addition to the issue of greenhouse gas emissions, a number of other details required review, says Colleen McKaughan, associate director for the EPA's Region 9 Air Division. These included concerns related to fine particulate emissions, which can aggravate asthma and are major cause of haze.

The EPA's decision vindicated environmentalists and tribal activist groups -- including Dine Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment (Dine CARE) and Dooda (which means "No!") Desert Rock – who argued that the plant would have exacerbated the air-quality problems caused by the two massive coal plants already in the Four Corners region. Without the permit, declared Dooda Desert Rock's Elouise Brown, the plant was dead.

The Navajo Nation insists Desert Rock is still on track, however. Straussfeld says the company is now actively reviewing the project in order to take into account all the changes in the economy, in regulatory permitting and in electricity demand. It can only go forward if it has customers, he says, and much has changed: "Load growth pretty much went away. And investment in coal projects is being viewed very critically by the public utilities commissions."

For now, Sithe has no plans to resubmit its application to the EPA for the coal plant's air permit. Before it can make a decision, Straussfeld says, the company will have to figure out what Desert Rock's future might hold.

Laura Paskus is a freelance writer and former High Country News editor based in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

For an in-depth look at the rise and fall of Desert Rock, watch for Paskus's upcoming investigative story for HCN.

Link to original story: http://www.hcn.org/hcn/articles/the-death-of-desert-rock

Press Release: COAL PLANT FAILS IN PENNSYLVANIA COAL COUNTRY

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 21:45:39 -0700

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Wednesday, Feb. 24, 2010

Contacts:

Randy Francisco, Sierra Club, Pennsylvania, 412-802-6161

Anna Frazier, Coordinator, Diné CARE, 928-380-7697

Rob Disney, Sierra Club, Las Vegas, 702-518-0188

COAL PLANT FAILS IN PENNSYLVANIA COAL COUNTRY

Health Risks and Controversy Remain At Sites in NM And NV

KARTHAUS, Penn. – An international energy developer financed by Wall Street equity firm The Blackstone Group has abandoned plans for a proposed 300-megawatt waste-coal power plant in rural Pennsylvania.

Sithe Global, which is also behind the proposed Toquop coal plant in Nevada and the Desert Rock plant on the Navajo reservation in New Mexico, announced Tuesday it was canceling its proposed $600 million River Hill plant near Karthaus, Penn. due to financing difficulties.

Progress on Sithe’s other two coal projects has also stalled as a result of permitting and financing difficulties and intense opposition from local communities who say the potential harm to their air, water and health far outweighs any economic benefits from the plants.

“We have suspected for a long time that the River Hill project was very tenuous at best,” said Randy Francisco, of the Sierra Club in Pennsylvania. “It says a lot about the viability of these dirty coal plant proposals when they can’t get taxpayer bailouts and they can’t make them pencil out even with the backing of a company with pockets as deep as Blackstone’s.”

Anna Frazier, coordinator of the Navajo group Diné CARE, said that Sithe’s proposed Desert Rock plant is also on equally shaky ground after suffering one setback after another over the past year. Desert Rock’s pollution permit was withdrawn by the EPA in Septermber, a permit for the transmission right-of-way needed to get the power to Southwest markets was overturned earlier in 2009, and the Department of Energy denied Sithe a request for $450 million in federal stimulus dollars late last year.

“The Navajo communities of Northwest New Mexico have always been opposed to Desert Rock, so we are encouraged by the cancellation of the River Hill project,” said Frazier. “In an area that is already under siege by pollution from fossil-fuel development, Desert Rock has been a six-year black hole that has wasted millions of dollars that could have been used to bring clean-energy projects to the Four Corners region.”

Sithe’s proposed Toquop plant near Mesquite, Nev., originally proposed as a natural gas-fired plant, also has been on the drawing board for years but still does not have a pollution permit or an approved BLM environmental impact analysis, and last year the project lost rights to water it needs for to operate.

“We’ve been trying to persuade Sithe for years to focus on developing Nevada’s vast solar and wind resources instead of outdated and dirty coal,” said Mesquite Mayor Susan Holecheck. “Hopefully, Sithe’s decision to abandon the Pennsylvania plant is a signal that we can soon put the nail in Toquop’s coffin, too, and get it out of the way for clean-energy jobs and economic development in Nevada.”

Air Quality: Request to Clean Up Four Corners Timely

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 21:49:54 -0700

Air quality

Request to clean up Four Corners timely

Article Last Updated; Thursday, February 18, 2010 12:00AM

A collection of environmentally minded organizations led by the National Parks Conservation Association has petitioned two federal cabinet departments to declare northwest New Mexico's Four Corners Power Plant to be in violation of the Clean Air Act and thereby force it to be cleaned up. It is an effort that should be joined by area governments, greens and business interests. Whether driven by concern for nature, the local economy or sales-tax revenue, clean air is in all of our interests.

The petitioners include Earthjustice, the Sierra Club, the San Juan Citizens Alliance, the Center for Biological Diversity, Dooda Desert Rock, Diné CARE, WildEarth Guardians and the Grand Canyon Trust. They should be joined, however, by anyone with a concern for Southwest Colorado's economic health. This is not only an environmental issue.

The petition was directed at the Department of Interior, which oversees the National Park Service and the Bureau of Land Management, and the Department of Agriculture, which includes the Forest Service. Together, those agencies are responsible for most of America's public lands.

The focus of the request was on protecting the national parks, forests and monuments affected by pollution from the Four Corners plant. Those include Mesa Verde, the Grand Canyon, the San Juan National Forest, Utah's Canyonlands and Bryce Canyon, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, any number of important cultural and archeological sites on tribal lands and the Weminuche Wilderness.

The petitioners say records kept by the plant's operator, Arizona Public Service, show the Four Corners plant - one of the largest coal-fired plants in the country - is also the largest source of air pollution in New Mexico. Each of the plant's five units burns more than 10 million tons of coal each year, and releases 1,300 tons of particulates, 12,000 tons of sulfur dioxide and 42,000 tons of nitrogen oxides.

Not included in the groups' announcement was the mercury already detected in area lakes and fish. Nor does it mention another good reason to clean up the power plant - its potential effect on the area's economy.

As the groups point out, the Four Corners plant is less than 200 miles from 16 national parks and wilderness areas. Those natural wonders, as well as man-made treasures such as those at Mesa Verde, together constitute the principal draw that supports Southwest Colorado's tourist industry. And people do not pay good money to come to Mesa Verde, to hike the San Juans or gaze out over the Grand Canyon so they can squint through a brown cloud. Too many of them can do that at home.

The petitioners report that the National Park Service says the Four Corners plant has the most effect on national park visibility of any coal-fired plant in the country. They also say modeling done by Arizona Public Service shows that Four Corners pollution cuts visibility by 25 times the level the EPA defines as “impairment."

Referring to the more than 40-years-old plant as “dirty" and “outdated," a spokeswoman for the National Parks Conservation Association correctly said, “It's time for the EPA to take action to protect our residents' health and our cultural and scenic treasures."

Doing so would also help Southwest Colorado's motels, shops and restaurants continue to prosper. And with that, local communities might better weather what may be enduring economic problems.

http://durangoherald.com/sections/Opinion/2010/02/18/Air_quality/

AIR POLLUTION: Coalition petitions to curb haze from N.M. coal-burning power plant (02/17/2010)

Robin Bravender, E&E reporter

A coalition of environmental groups asked the Obama administration today to declare that the pollution from a coal-burning power plant in northwest New Mexico is violating federal law by fouling air over national parks and wilderness areas.

The groups petitioned the Interior and Agriculture departments, asking them to formally certify to U.S. EPA that poor visibility in 16 national parks and wilderness areas can be reasonably attributed to emissions from the Four Corners Power Plant.

The petitioners are the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), Earthjustice, the Sierra Club, the San Juan Citizens Alliance, the Center for Biological Diversity, Dooda Desert Rock, Diné CARE, WildEarth Guardians and the Grand Canyon Trust.

The 2,040-megawatt Navajo Nation power plant has long been the target of environmentalists. The Four Corners plant is one of the nation's largest industrial emitters of nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, particulate matter and carbon dioxide.

"Emissions from this dirty, outdated coal plant have obscured priceless views in our national parks in a brown haze for years," said Stephanie Kodish, Clean Air Counsel for NPCA. "It's time for EPA to take action to protect our residents' health and our cultural and scenic treasures."

"The Four Corners power plant meets or exceeds all federal and state environmental regulations and we continue to seek solutions that achieve environmental goals while keeping the plant financially viable," said Damon Gross, a spokesman for Arizona Public Service Co, the plant's principal owner and operator.

The National Park Service has found that the Four Corners power plant has the greatest visibility impact on Class I national parks of any coal plant in the country, the groups said. Mesa Verde, Canyonlands and Arches National Parks are among those most affected by Four Corners' pollution, according to the environmental groups.

The environmental groups hope that a certification by the Interior and Agriculture Departments will prod EPA to require more stringent technologies to address visibility problems in the nearby parks and wilderness areas.

New Mexico Senate Panel Approves Pore Space Bill

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:41:26 -0700

Associated Press

New Mexico Senate panel approves pore space bill

By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN , 02.04.10, 05:46 PM EST

SANTA FE, N.M. -- A Senate committee has approved legislation that would establish ownership rights for the empty spaces that lie beneath New Mexico's dusty landscape.

Supporters of the measure say the so-called pore space will be valuable as technology advances to capture and store carbon dioxide emissions from fossil-fuel power plants and other industries. Three Western states already have tackled pore space ownership, and many others are considering legislation that would lay the groundwork for carbon capture and storage.

New Mexico's effort is being led by Jack Chatfield, a rancher from northeastern New Mexico who has been spending every day at the state Capitol to ensure the bill passes.

He said Thursday he was pleased with the 8-3 vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee. It clears the way for the bill to be heard by the full Senate.

"It's a win-win type of legislation that will put New Mexico into position to deal with cutting-edge technology. It will ensure the property rights of landowners and maintain a healthy oil and gas industry," Chatfield said.

The bill is considered the first step toward establishing a carbon storage market in the state. Supporters believe common law is clear that surface owners own the rights to pore space, but the legislation aims to spell that out to avoid legal challenges.

Representatives of the oil and natural gas industry have said they want to make sure the legislation will not infringe on their rights to develop leases for oil and gas deposits. The pore space that would be used for carbon storage lies about a half-mile underground.

Mark Fesmire, director of the state Oil Conservation Division, said the legislation represents a "baby step" toward carbon storage and the state would have to follow by establishing regulations to address safety, long-term liability and other concerns that could arise from carbon storage.

Storing carbon dioxide deep below the earth's surface has not yet been tested on a large scale in the United States. It is being done in Norway's North Sea, where the world's first commercial carbon capture and storage project is sequestering about one million metric tons of carbon dioxide each year.

Fesmire said he sees carbon storage as a "transition technology" that the U.S. can use to limit emissions while more renewable resources such as wind and solar are worked into the nation's energy portfolio.

One benefit, he said, is that carbon storage would require the same personnel, skills and machinery that is used during oil and gas development.

"The natural gas and oil industry is often cyclical. What this will do is be countercyclical and put some of the drillers, engineers, geologists and landmen to work when the oil and gas industry is down," he said.

New Yorkers get Toquop message

Robyn Jackson — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 19:43:06 -0700

Bob Challinor, Desert Valley Times

Michele Burkett traveled all the way to New York City to give Stephen Schwarzman the Christmas present she thought he deserved – a lump of coal.

The gift was ironic and symbolic. Schwarzman is CEO of The Blackstone Group, the financial behemoth that owns 80 percent of Sithe Global, Inc., the company planning to build the Toquop coal-fired power plant 12 miles northwest of Mesquite. Blackstone also is financing two other large coal-burning plants, Desert Rock in the Navajo Nation and the River Hill project in Pennsylvania.

Burkett, president of Defend Our Desert and a member of the Energy Task Force, has led opposition to the Toquop plant ever since construction plans were revealed for it. Last week she appeared right outside The Blackstone Group’s headquarters.

Dressed as an elf and accompanied by Robert Disney of the Sierra Club, who appeared as Santa Claus, Burkett joined several other representatives and leaders from grass roots groups in a sidewalk protest below Schwarzman’s office. Burkett carried a stocking containing a lump of coal and a post card picturing a little boy breathing through an oxygen mask.

Christmas greeting on the card: “Stephen Schwarzman, there’s a reason you’re getting coal in your stocking this year.”

On the back of the card was another message: “Dear Stephen Schwarzman, If you go through with your plan to pollute our air with more dirty coal plants, we’re all going to have to ask Santa for oxygen tanks for Christmas. Please invest in clean, renewable energy instead.”

The anti-coal activists handed out coal and postcards to passers-by.

“It was an opportunity to tell our story,” Burkett said.

Burkett took advantage of other opportunities in the Big Apple. The hotel where she stayed happened to be next door to a restaurant that featured coal-fired pizza.

“Most pizza is baked in wood-fired ovens,” Burkett said. “This restaurant had coal-fired pizza ovens. We wanted to deliver coal to the CEO of Blackstone so we went to a reasonably-sized store looking for coal brickettes. We couldn’t find any, but we went back to the pizza kitchen and we got pieces of coal.”

Defend Our Desert was joined by activists from the Sierra Club, Diné Care and the San Juan Citizens Alliance who delivered their message to Blackstone.

“That morning we walked down to the Blackstone building on Park Avenue – it was about eight blocks from our hotel – and I was dressed as an elf and Robert was dressed as Santa,” Burkett said. “Most people say that people in New York won’t make eye contact. We had people who not only looked at us but actually said, ‘Santa, I’ve been good.’

“We had a permit to stand on the sidewalk and make noise. We handed out postcards. Police came over and said hello and were very nice. I had only been in New York once, and the reception this time was very unique. I found the city to be very friendly.

“We were there at 7:30 a.m. to catch business people heading into the building who might actually deliver the message. We had several business people at break time, about five or six young executives who approached us and asked what was going on. We talked about the future, how power plants were burning yesterday’s technology for 50 years. People were interested in our story.

“A Sierra Club man from New York said it was unusual to see so many New York people give us this kind of recognition. It really doesn’t resonate to New Yorkers where power comes from. We drive by Reid-Gardner (power plant) every day and see hydrological dams, but in New York people are not aware of what generates electricity.”

During the rally, Burkett spotted a man taking notes and watching the group.

“I approached him, and he was from the Wall Street Journal,” Burkett said. “He heard our story.”

And Daniel Hausmann included what Burkett told him in an article that appeared in the paper. Burkett and Disney said Nevada and New Mexico both have several clean energy options and don’t need to build more coal-fired power plants.

“We do think they have alternatives,” Burkett told Hausmann. “They could finance solar as easily as coal.”

“A Blackstone shareholder walked by our group and saw that we were protesting against Blackstone’s financial support of dirty coal plants,” Burkett said. “She said, ‘I’m Blackstone shareholder. What’s going on?’ She listened to our story and said, ‘I don’t agree with what’s going on. I’m going to write a letter to them.’”

Schwarzman’s financial support of coal-fired plants was a contrast to another corporate CEO’s stance, Burkett said.

“The word we use is corporate responsibility,” she said. “I saw a TV interview with the CEO of Pepsico on trying to do the right thing. When they take water out of the ground, they put it back. They try to ship more efficiently. Right now it’s voluntary to do these kinds of things, but smart companies recognize change is coming before regulation. Smart companies are making changes.”

Burkett also said it was fascinating to meet leaders from other activist groups.

“Lori Goodman of Diné Care is fighting against the [Desert] Rock coal plant,” Burkett said. “She’s going against the Navajo Tribal Council that supports the new plant in New Mexico. San Juan Citizens Alliance leader Mike Eisenfeld said he and his group have watched the continuing pollution of the San Juan River exiting from plants in the Navajo Nation. It was great to meet the leaders of these grassroots groups.”

Burkett said it was most satisfying to connect to others who probably would not have known Defend Our Desert’s fight against the proposed Toquop coal-fired plant.

“I truly think being able to look into the eyes of people who I’ll never meet again and see them give us a nod that said, ‘You’re working on something important,’” Burkett said. “I felt that. I think the elf outfit breaks the barriers. It was an experience that won’t ever happen again in my life. It was quite unique.”

Michele Burkett, left, wears an elf suit as she joins other protesters outside the headquarters of the Blackstone Group in New York. (Justin Wilson / Media Resources)

Source: http://www.thespectrum.com/article/20091222/DVTONLINE01/91221008/1053/DVTONLINE/New+Yorkers+get+Toquop+message

Public News Service also has an article on this:

http://www.publicnewsservice.org/index.php?/content/article/11930-1

BIA withdraws assessment for Desert Rock

Robyn Jackson — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 20:01:43 -0700

By Sue Major Holmes
Albuquerque, New Mexico (AP) 12-09

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has withdrawn its biological assessment for a proposed power plant in northwestern New Mexico, saying it has “significant concerns” about the impact of mercury and selenium on two endangered fish species in the San Juan River.

BIA Director Jerry Gidner, in a letter Thursday to Fish and Wildlife Service Southwest Regional Director Benjamin Tuggle, said the decision will allow more time for coordination between Tuggle’s staff, the BIA and the Environmental Protection Agency.

It was the second review of federal decisions for the $3 billion coal-fired Desert Rock Energy Project on the Navajo Nation.

In September, the Environmental Appeals Board in part granted a request by regional EPA officials who wanted to review parts of an air permit issued last year.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. also said he wanted the project to add equipment designed to capture carbon emissions from Desert Rock.

Gidner’s letter said adding such a component would require additional analysis and possibly a supplement to the biological assessment.

The Navajo Nation’s Dine Power Authority and Houston-based Sithe Global LLC, who have partnered to build the 1,500-megawatt power plant south of Farmington, have said Desert Rock would be one of the cleanest coal-burning plants in the nation.

Messages were left after hours seeking comment from the Navajo Nation and Desert Rock officials.

They also have said it would generate more than $50 million in annual revenues and create jobs on a reservation where more than half of people are unemployed.

Environmentalists, the state of New Mexico and some Navajos have voiced concerns about the project, saying a third coal-fired plant in the Four Corners region would compromise air quality, human health and the environment.

Mike Eisenfeld of one opponent group, San Juan Citizens Alliance, said a more in-depth biological assessment “would only delay the inevitable conclusion that Desert Rock should never be built.”

“Desert Rock would add more pollution to a river system already polluted beyond thresholds for selenium and mercury,” he said.

New Mexico Environment Secretary Ron Curry said the state is confident the BIA and EPA will agree there should be no new coal plants “without the latest and greatest environmental controls, including limits on greenhouse gas emissions.”

Quoted from News from Indian Country:
http://indiancountrynews.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=8143

Desert Rock project dealt crippling blow

Robyn Jackson — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 20:18:54 -0700

by Megan Graham
in The Durango Herald

[Article Last Updated; Thursday, December 10, 2009 12:32PM]

The proponents of the Desert Rock Energy Project are nothing if not persistent.

However painful though, learning when to take a hint is an important life lesson for anyone, and Sithe Global is no exception. It is time to walk away from the proposed 1,500-megawatt coal-fired power plant near Shiprock.

The signs have been growing increasingly ominous for Desert Rock's chances at approval. Beginning with a partial remand of its air permit, then a full remand by the Environmental Protection Agency, the project has had a difficult year in its journey through the regulatory process. This challenge should not evoke sympathy, though. That Sithe and its partners had made it as far as they had was more a function of the political climate than the validity of the process.

The science was shoddy or incomplete, and the premise was fundamentally flawed: We simply do not need - nor do we want - a brand-new coal-fired power plant to be built within spitting distance from two of the nation's dirtiest existing facilities. This sentiment is true no matter how the project's proponents attempt to sugarcoat what they propose. Their latest attempt similarly fell flat.

Until the air permit was remanded in September, Desert Rock's proponents had long claimed their project was not a viable one for using carbon-capture or carbon-sequestration technology - methods intended to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions associated with burning coal and other fossil fuels. After the air permit was revoked, though, the idea suddenly sounded good, and developers applied for $450 million in stimulus money to fund the pollution controls at the facility. The ploy was too little, too late, and the Department of Energy saw it for what it was: The request was denied.

There may be merit to carbon-capture/carbon-sequestration technology, but the problem goes deeper than that. In order to meaningfully address the climate change that carbon dioxide emissions contribute to, there must be a wholesale shift away from creating those emissions in the first place. That is the direction Desert Rock proponents - including those on the Navajo Nation who support the project - should look. There is every incentive in the world to transform Desert Rock from a polluting contributor to poor regional air quality, diminished public health and global climate change into a cutting-edge demonstration project of renewable-energy technology.

Attempting an end-run around the science - once again - by trying for stimulus money for carbon capture/sequestration technology without first conducting the proper studies suggests desperation from Desert Rock proponents. That the effort was dismissed should be a sign taken to heart.

The political winds - and those of public opinion - are blowing coal-fired power plants off the drawing board. It is time those touting the projects get the message and invest their energy elsewhere.

There is much good that can come from such efforts. The same cannot be said for continued attempts at winning approval for a project whose negative implications for many far outweigh the benefits to be enjoyed by the few who stand to profit.

meg@sanjuancitizens.org Megan Graham is director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance.

Source: Desert Rock Project Dealt Crippling Blow

Desert Rock carbon capture stimulus request denied

Robyn Jackson — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 20:15:13 -0700

By Marjorie Childress, The New Mexico Independent
12/8/09 2:55 PM

The government has denied Desert Rock Energy Company's bid for a federal stimulus grant, the Farmington Daily Times reported today. The company had hoped to use the money to include carbon capture sequestration technology into the project design of a coal-fired power plant near Farmington. Opponents of the project say the decision by the Department of Energy shows the Desert Rock project, which had it’s air permit pulled by the Environmental Protection Agency in September, isn’t feasible.

“It doesn’t look good for the Desert Rock project. I don’t see how they could possibly find more funds or expect the Navajo Nation to pay the remaining (expense),” Dáilan Long, of the anti-Desert Rock group Diné Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment, told the Daily Times. “It should be a signal for them (Navajo Tribal Council) to pull out and dump the whole project.”

The $450 million grant was seen as a way to green-light the project, according to Frank Maisano, spokesperson for Sithe Global, the parent company for Desert Rock.

“I would suspect that if the stimulus money came through, it would be a strong reason for the project to move forward,” Maisano told the Independent last week.

A representative of the Navajo Nation and the Desert Rock development, Doug MacCourt, told the Daily Times that the project was denied due to paperwork, and was not an indication that the project wasn’t viable.

But Nathan Plagens, vice president of the Desert Rock Energy Company, acknowledged to the Daily Times that increased government regulation of fossil-fuel power posed hurdles to the project without the incorporation of the carbon capture technology, and that the company would see how “the politics” play out before moving forward:

Given the ongoing restrictions being added to emissions standards nationwide, Desert Rock likely will wait to see how the politics play out before continuing the permitting process, he said.

“By no means is the project dead,” Plagens said. “There’s still some basis of this project being technically sound, but going forward, you’ve got to figure out and muddle through … the politics and potential regulations.”

Source: http://newmexicoindependent.com/42862/desert-rock-carbon-capture-stimulus-request-denied

Tribe's environmental fight

Robyn Jackson — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:34:51 -0700

Coal mines and power plant give Navajos income, controversy
by Dennis Wagner - Nov. 2, 2009 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

WINDOW ROCK - A green controversy fueled by coal-fired power plants is raging on America's largest Indian reservation.

On one side is Joe Shirley Jr., president of the Navajo Nation, who rejects the notion of climate change even though he recently won an international award for environmentalism. On the other are environmentalists opposed to power plants in Indian Country and to the coal mines that provide their fuel. Caught in the middle are tribal members concerned with economic survival and the protection of sacred lands.

The dispute centers on fundamental questions of religion and heritage, as well as tribal finances.

The Navajo Generating Station near Page, which uses coal from mines on Black Mesa, employs hundreds of tribal members and helps finance the tribal government. The Desert Rock Energy Project, proposed in western New Mexico, has been under consideration for years. The $3 billion plant would be fueled by coal from a new mine, bringing more jobs and revenue to the Navajos.

The Environmental Protection Agency wants the Navajo Generating Station to install costly air-scrubbing equipment, an expense the tribe and some Arizona utility companies say could lead to the plant's closure. Environmental groups, which have targeted the plant for years because of the emissions-related haze that builds up over the Grand Canyon, applaud the scrubbers.

Andy Bessler, Sierra Club regional representative in the Southwest, said coal-fired power plants account for about 30 to 40 percent of carbon emissions worldwide. The Navajo Generating Station, the nation's third-largest emitter of nitrogen oxides, spews 19.9 million tons of carbon emissions each year and uses 9.1 billion gallons of water - enough to fill Saguaro Lake twice with water left over. The nearby Four Corners Power Plant is the second-largest emitter of nitrogen oxides.

"If we want to take care of global warming, coal power plants are the low-hanging fruit," Bessler said. "We can't just continue with business as usual if we want to protect the planet."

But Shirley, who last week was suspended by the tribal council amid an unrelated Navajo power struggle, challenges the very theory of worldwide climate change.

"There's no signs that have told me it's a problem," he said. "There's a lot of people running around out there saying, 'The sky is going to fall down. It's going to be the end of the world.' I don't believe that. I don't know what global warming is about. . . . Maybe I'm blind, I don't know. Maybe I don't have the intelligence. But where are the signs?"

Shirley, whose father-in-law is a medicine man, acknowledged that some Navajo traditionalists recognize climate change as a threat and have joined tribal conservation groups such as Diné CARE in claiming he sold out Native heritage to big business. Those critics, he said, have been sucked in by environmentalist propaganda.

Last month, Shirley criticized the Sierra Club, Grand Canyon Trust and other green organizations for interfering with Navajo sovereignty and caring more about insects or fish than the lives of Native Americans. The rebuke was especially stunning from the leader of a tribe that has for years aligned itself with green groups in political causes.

Six months ago, Shirley accepted the Nuclear-Free Future Award in Norway for collaborating with environmental groups to fight uranium mines near the Grand Canyon. Shirley, a Christian, said he consulted with Navajo traditionalists before deciding that carbon-spewing power plants and open-pit coal mines do not damage the Earth.

But Tony Skrelunas, a Navajo who works as Native American program coordinator for the Grand Canyon Trust, expressed dismay that Shirley spoke of resources without emphasizing stewardship.

"Even sheep herders learn to protect land from overgrazing," he said, "and to do the right thing so rains will come. . . . The thing that I find shocking is that, as Navajos, we are taught that there are different monsters in creation that try to destroy us. I think one of those that is really rising up is climate change."

More than 1,500 United Nations climate scientists agree that Earth's temperature has begun to rise at a potentially disastrous rate, and that carbon emissions are the major cause. Skrelunas noted a study issued this spring by Jayne Belnap, a scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey, which says global warming is expected to increase temperatures in the Four Corners area 10 degrees by 2100. Already, Belnap reports, drought has tripled the number of dust storms swirling from the high desert into the Colorado Rockies.

"I grew up on Big Mountain. We raised sheep," said Skrelunas. "It's massively different now. . . . Not as green. It doesn't rain anymore. There are lots of dust storms."

The Navajo reservation sprawls over portions of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, with an estimated population over 250,000.

Anna Frazier, coordinator for Diné CARE, said the mines and electric plants have wrecked the land, sucked springs dry and polluted skies. She said Shirley ignores those facts, trading heritage for short-term cash.

"He's ignoring the fundamental laws of the Navajo people," Frazier said. "Our traditions tell us we have to protect and preserve all living things."

Shirley said his priority is to help the Navajo people, who suffer from an unemployment rate over 50 percent, with average annual incomes under $15,000.

Environmentalists have exacerbated the financial woes, he added, forcing the closure of a tribal sawmill and helping to shut down another power plant - the Mohave Generating Station near Laughlin, Nev. - that received coal from Black Mesa.

"They came onto our land," Shirley said. "They didn't tell me, 'Here, Mr. President. Here are other green jobs.' They just shut us down, put more people into impoverishment. You want me to accept that?

"I'm working on independence, period," he said. "If it takes green jobs to get us back to standing on our own two feet, I'm for green jobs. If it takes Desert Rock or Navajo Generating Station . . . I'm for Desert Rock and Navajo Generating Station."

Source: http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2009/11/02/20091102navajo1102.html

Navajo Nation gets $4.9M for smart grid

Robyn Jackson — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 22:40:03 -0600

Navajo Nation Gets $4.9M for Smart Grid
By Steve Lynn
The Farmington Daily Times
Posted: 10/28/2009 12:00:00 AM MDT

FARMINGTON The Navajo Nation will receive $4.9 million in stimulus funding to develop a smart electrical grid.
The money would fund a smart grid for the Nation that quickly would identify electrical system outages, monitor people's appliances for efficiency and better facilitate the use of alternative energy.

The U.S. Department of Energy on Tuesday announced $3.4 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding for smart grid projects throughout the nation.

"This is an important investment in the Navajo Nation, one that will result in better service to the (Navajo Tribal Utility Authority's) nearly 40,000 customers," Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., said in a prepared statement announcing the funding. "At the same time, this grant will help create good jobs in the area."

Bingaman, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, helped create the smart grid stimulus grant funding, according to the statement.

The funding will advance the use of renewable energy sources in the region, Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., said in the statement.

"Implementation of smart grid technology can help transform our energy infrastructure in the places we need it the most, like the Navajo Nation," Udall said in the statement.

No funds for Farmington

The city of Farmington, which applied for the same federal grant money as the Nation, did not receive any funding.

"I regret to inform you that your application was not selected for award," an Energy Department letter to the city stated. "This result represents the level of competition rather than a reflection on your application."

Another letter will provide details on the Energy Department's review of the Electric Utility, The letter stated.
The Energy Department received almost 400 applications for $9.3 billion in requests for smart grid projects.

The city's Farmington Electric Utility System budgeted almost $17 million for a smart grid, Electric Utility director Maude Grantham-Richards said.

Grantham-Richards was disappointed and said the lack of federal funding would delay the smart grid project.
Almost $2 million is budgeted for smart grid meters through the next two years, and another $15 million for other smart grid equipment over the next six years, Grantham-Richards said.

But there are unresolved issues with smart grids, such as whether they can be protected against security cyber attacks, she said. The utility wants to research those issues further before the project goes forward.

"We're going to take our time moving into this," she said.

Jen Stutsman, an Energy Department spokeswoman, said she could not comment on specifics of individual applications.

Energy Department experts considered several factors in deciding where funding would go, including job creation and the ability to provide at least an equal amount of funding for the smart grid, Stutsman said.
That means the Nation would have to contribute at least an additional $4.9 million toward its smart grid, Stutsman said.

"The department chose the highest ranking proposals that we felt could best put us on a path to transition towards a cleaner, smarter, more efficient electrical grid in the country," she said.

Smart grids include devices that monitor people's electrical use and the ability for heating and air-conditioning systems and appliances to be turned off at times when electricity is used most. People also could better monitor their own electricity use and its cost.

Navajo Tribal Utility Authority officials did not respond to telephone calls and an e-mail requesting comment Tuesday.

Steve Lynn:
slynn@daily-times.com
Source Link: http://www.daily-times.com/ci_13658109

Special report: Desert Rock debate continues

Robyn Jackson — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 22:44:17 -0600

Special Report: Desert Rock Debate Continues
By James Monteleone

The Farmington Daily Times
Posted: 10/25/2009 12:00:00 AM MDT

NENAHNEZAD Navajo Nation leaders are increasingly looking to the proposed Desert Rock power plant to surge the tribal economy as new environmental rules threaten operations at existing coal-fired plants, potentially costing hundreds of jobs and millions in tribal revenues.

The Desert Rock Energy Project sets itself apart from other generating facilities on the Navajo Nation because the tribe intends to invest more than $350 million into it, earning a 25 percent share in the $4 billion power plant's revenues that would provide millions in additional tribal income, said Doug MacCourt, representing the Diné Power Authority.

Critics of the development, however, claim the alleged economic gains will not trump the health and environmental costs to be paid by the Navajo and other residents of the Four Corners over the lifespan of a third coal-fired power plant within a single 30-mile radius if all three exist.

Desert Rock, proposed to be built in Nenahnezad about 25 miles southwest of Farmington, describes itself as a modern "ultra low" emissions facility that will produce a fraction of the chemicals and greenhouse gases emitted by the other two decades-old power plants in the area. The project, developed in conjunction with Texas-based developer Sithe Global, is on hold after the Environmental Protection Agency in April revoked an air quality permit for the facility, regardless of the proposed improvements describes Desert Rock as the key to the tribe's future.

The Navajo investment in Desert Rock, which would be paid almost entirely by borrowing from bank and bond markets, would be repaid over a 25-year period.

It likely would require payments less than what the Navajo Nation projects as its tax-free revenues from electricity generation. The tribe could opt to purchase rights for as much as 49 percent of the plant. However, the additional share is available only at a higher market rate.

The tribe anticipates earning more than $14 million in profit in the first year of Desert Rock's operation with a 25 percent share, and more than $46 million after 10 years of operation, MacCourt said.

"As you start getting out into year 25-plus, you're talking about really significant numbers for that 25 percent stake," MacCourt said. "When you couple that this will be financed largely through the security on the revenue stream, it's pretty much a no-brainer."

Utilizing Navajo resources

The two existing power plants on Navajo land could be forced to reduce operations and lay off as many as 300 plant workers if the EPA opts to require $1 billion in haze-improving environmental upgrades under consideration, company officials claim.

A project like Desert Rock capable of adding new, high-wage jobs is critical to the Navajo Nation, where a reported 50 percent of residents are out of work, according to the Navajo Nation Office of the President and Vice-President.

Similar to the Four Corners Power Plant in Fruitland and the Navajo Generating Station in Page, Ariz., Desert Rock would provide an additional 400 full-time plant operations and mining jobs to Navajo workers and more than $50 million in tribal taxes and natural resource royalties. The four-year construction of Desert Rock also will employ more than 1,000 temporary workers.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley was unavailable to comment on the Desert Rock project.

The bottom line for the Navajo Nation will continue to be supporting the needs of the community, and revenues and jobs provided by the project will go a long way to help improve the quality of life for tribal residents, Shirley spokesman George Hardeen said.

"Ultimately i's for jobs. That's Joe Shirley's perspective; jobs and revenue for the Nation to fund the services it provides," he said. "It takes money to address these, and Desert Rock is an important component to help generate the revenue needed. ... If we could make the same amount of money selling incense and candles that we could make selling electricity, we'd be in the incense and candles business. But energy production is and historically has been the most lucrative business wherever you go."

Taking an opportunity to create new revenues utilizing the 200-year coal supply available through the BHP Navajo Mine, the tribe has a unique opportunity to combine its investment in the facility with its rights to a large coal supply. It also could profit from a growing regional demand for electricity, Desert Rock advocates claim.

"With this power plant, they get it from a tax side, they get it from a (land) lease side, they get it as a revenue site," said Frank Maisano, an attorney representing Sithe Global and spokesman for the Desert Rock project. "There's a multitude of ways that the coal benefits them, and multiplies itself into direct benefit for the Navajo people."

Not a fix-all

Critics of Desert Rock argue the project is seen by some Navajo leaders as a fix-all solution to Navajo problems, welcomed without taking into consideration the long-term consequences of creating a third power plant in the region.

"The tribe is just taking whatever pennies they can get, and whatever pennies they can get, they think it's going to be able to solve all the financial problems that the tribe has," said Dailan Long, with Diné Citizens Against Ruining Our Environment. "I think the tribe doesn't acknowledge some of the environmental costs, or some of the health costs, or some of the social costs that are already being incurred."

Although the project has promised dramatically lower chemical emissions, better research is needed to understand how the chemical byproducts continue to burden human health in northwest New Mexico, where numbers of children requiring medical treatment for asthma and other respiratory conditions annually increases, critics contend.

But in the cost-benefit analysis that weighs community health against economics for the Desert Rock project, the prospect of new money continues to win out among tribal decision makers, Long said.

Another concern cited by critics is that any new money created by the power plant project will go to fund pet projects of Navajo leaders, rather than reinvested money into the Nenahnezad and Burnham communities directly affected by the power plant blight and pollution.

The Nenahnezad Chapter, unanimously approving the Desert Rock site lease in 2004, requested $2 million for a community health facility, "a percentage" of the plant royalties be returned to the chapter for capital projects, annual pro-rated power plant funds to pay chapter scholarships and needed road construction equipment, according to the chapter resolution.

Chapter President Lucinda Bennalley could not be reached for comment regarding the status of the chapter requests.

"Proponents of the power plant are using economic development as an excuse. We can't use an excuse and put the lives of the people at risk. We can't just be thinking in dollar signs," said Elouise Brown, president of the anti-Desert Rock group, Dooda Desert Rock. "No matter how much money this proposed plant generates, it's not going to be enough to keep the people healthy, and our lives are not worth dollars in any amount."

James Monteleone:
jmonteleone@daily-times.com

Source Link: http://www.daily-times.com/ci_13637635?source=most_viewed

Diné CARE -- Mission and Contact

Robyn Jackson — Sun, 17 Dec 2006 21:26:25 -0700

Diné Citizens Against Ruining our Environment (Diné CARE) formed in the late 1980's as the the first Navajo grassroots environmental organization within the Navajo homeland. We continue to educate and advocate for environmental justice, based on our traditional Diné teachings and a commitment to protect and provide a voice for all life within the Four Sacred Mountains. We promote alternative uses of natural resources that are consistent with the Diné philosophy of the "Beauty Way." Our main goal is to empower local and regional community people to organize, speak out on issues that matter to them, and participate in nurturing a healthy environment. Diné CARE's goal to preserve the Diné lifeway starts from the ground up, within the homes of those living in the most impacted communities.

We are a non-profit organization 501(c)(3) by and for the Diné, the People. We do not collect dues or run membership drives. Our work is funded primarily through the support of volunteers, foundations and donors. Our members are not only those who are leaders in their communities, but all those Diné who strive to maintain a relationship with Mother Earth based on the concepts of Balance and Harmony. For us, membership means taking up the cause of Honoring Mother Earth and Honoring our Relations to our Environment. We are local, community people working together on issues that affect our communities.

Visit Dine' CARE's Homepage

Lori Goodman
10 A Town Plaza, PMB 138
Durango, CO 81301
PH: (970) 259-0199
FAX: (970) 259-2300
Cell: (970) 759-1908
kiyaani@frontier.net