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Groups Challenge Proposed Power Plants' Emissions

Posted on: Monday, 27 February 2006, 18:00 CST

By Victoria Advocate, Texas

Feb. 27--Victoria Advocate Victoria's air could be fouled by two new power plants to be built in Point Comfort -- or so contends a coalition of groups opposing the plants. But the companies involved say both plants will use environmentally friendly technology and create jobs.

Central Power & Light's old natural-gas-fired E.S. Joslin power plant near the Port of Port Lavaca-Point Comfort is to be reactivated as a petroleum-coke-fueled plant by NuCoastal Power in association with the Calhoun County Navigation District.

One plant would be built by Taiwan-based Formosa Plastics, the other by NuCoastal Power of Houston.

Permits for both plants are now being reviewed by state regulators.

NuCoastal says its new plant would produce electricity for retail customers at lower cost.

Formosa says its plant would provide low-cost energy for its Point Comfort petrochemical facility that would help the company remain competitive in world markets.

Emissions threat

Emissions from the two proposed power plants "could affect air quality in the Victoria area and harm others who live downwind," said Tom "Smitty" Smith, Texas director of Public Citizen, one of the groups in the coalition opposing the plants.

Smith said mercury emissions from the plants could "impact those who love to use Texas waterways for hunting and fishing."

The Point Comfort plants would release a combined 96 pounds per year of toxic mercury, according to information from plant permit applications obtained by the coalition, which also includes the Sierra Club; the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition, or SEED; Texas Black Bass Unlimited; the Blue Skies Alliance, TPOWER; Austin Physicians for Social Responsibility; and Our Lives, Our Land.

Karen Hadden, executive director of SEED, said the two Point Comfort power plants "would further contaminate waters so polluted with mercury and other pollutants that the area has been off limits to fishing for over a decade."

Lavaca Bay waters in the area of Point Comfort's Alcoa plant became a federal Superfund toxic-waste cleanup site in the '90s after becoming contaminated with mercury from Alcoa.

And Hadden said the Point Comfort area is not the only one with mercury problems. "The entire Gulf Coast is under a mercury consumption warning for king mackerel," she said.

Ed Parten, director of Texas Black Bass Unlimited, said his group is concerned about the impacts of mercury on fish.

"We also want people to be able to safely feed their families through fishing. Adding more mercury into the air in the worst mercury-polluted state in the nation would make no sense."

Smith also said emissions from the proposed Point Comfort power plants "will be blowing into the Victoria area and their emissions may affect Victoria's air quality and push it closer to non-attainment."

Victoria has been identified as being close to "non-attainment," or to exceeding federal standards for clean air. Exceeding those limits could force such measures as more stringent and costly standards for getting a vehicle-inspection sticker.

Roy J. Hart, project director for NuCoastal, said his company's plant would use the most environmentally friendly commercially available technology.

He said the technology is "well-proven," has been OK'd for permits in other Gulf Coast states, is approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, and meets all applicable state and federal air-quality requirements.

The 303-megawatt plant, which would be fueled 100 percent by petroleum coke, would generate enough power to furnish the electricity needs of some 110,000 homes.

The plant would not only provide "lower, more cost-effective energy" to customers, but would create 80 long-term, well-paid jobs in the community, the power company said.

During its three-year construction phase, the NuCoastal project would create up to 300 jobs for high-skilled local craftsman, the company said.

The NuCoastal plant would be built in cooperation with the Calhoun County Navigation District at the site of Central Power & Light's old E.S. Joslin plant near the Port of Port Lavaca-Point Comfort.

Formosa Plastics' Randy Smith, general manager of the company's Point Comfort plant, defended his firm's proposed power plant.

"Environmentally, this is a good project," Smith said.

The proposed power plant would use petroleum coke as a base fuel, supplemented with coal from Wyoming's Powder River Basin.

"The key to this project is to reduce the cost of electrical power while maintaining environmental quality," said Smith. "At this time, pet coke does this better than any other fuel we have available to us over the long term."

He said the first environmental benefit with using pet coke as a base fuel is the elimination of the need to dig open pits in the earth to mine coal.

Smith said the proposed 300-megawatt plant would use the best available technology -- the same technology to be used for the NuCoastal plant -- so emissions would be at low levels.

The ash left over from the process can be used to produce cement, fertilizers, roadbeds and other applications, he said.

The proposed plant would be near the Calhoun County Navigation District's docks in order to take advantage of access to the ship and barge traffic that would deliver the pet coke.

Smith said that if the permits are approved and Formosa decides to go ahead with the project after a feasibility study, then construction would begin.

The plant would take 36 to 40 months to complete.

The number of construction jobs would probably peak at about 1,400 workers, Smith said.

"Depending on the final design, we would anticipate having 100 to 150 operations and maintenance people involved in running the plant," he said.

Andrea Morrow, a spokesperson for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, said the permits for the Point Comfort power plants are being reviewed to make sure the plants meet state environmental standards.

"If not, we'll send them back," she said.

The environmental coalition says it is asking Gov. Rick Perry to enact a moratorium on the construction of the NuCoastal plant, the Formosa plant, as well as five other proposed new Texas power plants.

They suggest that the moratorium remain in place until the Legislature enacts laws to cut pollution and protect health.

The other coalition-opposed plants are proposed coal-burning facilities in Bexar County, McLennan County and Robertson County.

One of the plants, TXU's proposed 1,720-megawatt Oak Grove coal plant in Robertson County, about 120 miles south of Dallas, would be the nation's worst for mercury pollution, according to the coalition.

The Texas Medical Association has issued a statement calling for mercury reductions to protect health, the coalition said.

In a press release, the group said Gov. Perry recently signed an executive order expediting the permits for the proposed new power plants, cutting short the usual time that citizens can use to analyze and contest the permits.

"We call on Gov. Perry to issue a new executive order that would protect the health of Texans by restoring the timeline to contest permits," the groups said.

Gov. Perry's press secretary, Kathy Walt, defended the governor's Oct. 27 executive order, which requires the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to decide on new plant permits after no more than six months of review, according to the Dallas Morning News.

"There is no reason the state cannot make decisions on permits in six months and still follow all applicable state and federal laws," Walt said, adding that the governor is not pushing for the plants' approval.

The Dallas Morning News said TXU, Texas' biggest electricity retailer, contends it is using the best available control technology to limit smog-causing pollution and is researching ways to reduce mercury emissions.

"It's all about generating the electricity that customers demand, in a reliable and environmentally friendly way," TXU spokeswoman Kimberly Morgan told the Morning News.

According to the N.Y. Times News Service, energy industry observers say modern power plants are much cleaner than older ones.

"There's no doubt that newly constructed power plants are going to have a good deal of state-of-the-art equipment in them," said Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a national group of power-producing companies that works on air quality enforcement issues.

For more information on the environmental coalition's initiative, go to www.StoptheCoalPlant.org.

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Copyright (c) 2006, Victoria Advocate, Texas

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Source: Victoria Advocate, Victoria, Texas

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