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Environmentalists ask EPA to reject or revise coal-fired plant's permit
By Bob Downing
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Tuesday, Dec 04, 2007
Two environmental groups are calling on the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to reject or revise a preliminary permit for a new coal-burning power plant in southern Ohio.
The Ohio Environmental Council and the Natural Resources Defense Council on Monday came out strongly against the proposed $2.5 billion American Municipal Power-Ohio (AMP-Ohio) plant in Meigs County, calling the plans flawed.
AMP-Ohio, a Columbus-based wholesale power supplier, is very satisfied with the 960-megawatt plant and its pollution-control equipment, said spokesman Kent Carson.
The plant, expected to begin operations in 2013, is being funded by 87 communities in Ohio and four other states. Local communities include Cuyahoga Falls, Hudson, Wadsworth, Orrville, Seville, Lodi, Brewster and Beach City. They will get electricity from the plant.
The two environmental groups charged that the plant near Racine will not meet federal and state requirements to use the best available pollution control technology and to control global-warming emissions.
Instead, the plant will use Powerspan pollution-control equipment, which is unproven and much less effective, the groups said.
On Friday, the two groups, along with Ohio Citizen Action and the Sierra Club, filed paperwork urging the Ohio EPA to reject its preliminary air permit for the plant.
What the EPA does on the Meigs County project is important because it will set a precedent for other new power plants in Ohio, the two groups said.
If the project proceeds, the result would be higher emissions of air pollutants and the uncontrolled release of 7 million tons a year of carbon dioxide, a key global warming gas, the groups said.
At present, there are no federal restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions.
If the EPA won't reject the permit, the environmental groups called on it to strengthen the air limits and reissue the permit with more time for public input.
The EPA's failure to evaluate what they described as a better and cleaner coal-burning technology was ''especially egregious,'' the groups said.
The plant would rely on New Hampshire-based Powerspan Corp. emissions controls. The system, called Electro-Catalytic Oxidation, controls multiple pollutants and produces a waste product that can be used as fertilizer. FirstEnergy Corp. has been helping test the system at its R.E. Burger Power Plant in Belmont County.
AMP-Ohio is confident that the Powerspan technology will make the plant the cleanest in Ohio and one of the cleanest in the country, Carson said.
The Meigs County plant would be designed so carbon dioxide could also be captured in the future, he said.
The Natural Resources Defense Council, a national environmental group, last summer tried to sway local communities against proceeding with the Meigs County project. Only Westerville outside Columbus dropped out.
AMP-Ohio operates a coal-fired plant near Marietta, a hydroelectric project on the Ohio River and Ohio's first commercial wind farm near Bowling Green.
Bob Downing can be reached at 330-996-3745 or bdowning@thebeaconjournal.com.
Two environmental groups are calling on the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to reject or revise a preliminary permit for a new coal-burning power plant in southern Ohio.
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