Proposed Power Plant Gets State Environmental Permit

By James Mayse, Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.

Jan. 26–The state Environmental and Public Protection Cabinet has issued a permit for a 770-megawatt power plant to be built in Henderson County.

The state Division of Air Quality issued the air quality permit to Cash Creek Generation on Nov. 30, and the period for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to comment on the permit ended Jan. 14. A state environmental official said Friday the air permit for the plant is final and that the firm building the plant is free to begin construction.

But the process is not entirely over.

Members of the public who wish to petition against the plant receiving the permit have until March 14 to file a protest.

Cash Creek Generation LLC plans to build the gasification plant in Henderson County along the Daviess County line near Curdsville. The proposed plant, which has undergone a complete redesign since it was introduced in 2001, would be the most modern and least polluting power plant in the region, supporters have said.

But the state application summary issued in March said the plant will increase the region’s net emissions of particulate matter, carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide and sulfuric acid mist.

Opponents have said the plant will add to the region’s air pollution and knock several of the surrounding counties out of compliance with federal air quality standards. The city of Newburgh, Ind., also objected to the plant air quality application, saying emissions would add to Warrick County’s air quality problems.

During a public comment period last summer, the Sierra Club asserted the plant would harm regional air quality. In their response, the state air quality officials wrote: “The air quality modeling has shown that there will not be any exceedances of any air quality standards as a result of this new construction.”

The state also dismissed Sierra Club comments that the plant must take measures to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. The state response said carbon dioxide is not regulated under the federal Clean Air Act.

“All the emissions units are expected to meet the requirements of (Best Available Control Technology) for each significant pollutant,” state officials wrote in their recommendation that the permit be granted.

Officials from the Erora Group, the Louisville firm that plans to build Cash Creek, could not be reached Friday for comment.

Cash Creek is planned as a “merchant” plant that will sell its power to utilities or industries. David Schwartz, an Erora Group official, said last year the plant would cost “in excess of $1.5 billion” to build, and he said officials could start work on the plant this year.

Diana Andrews, assistant director for the Division of Air Quality, said the state published a notice about the proposed air permit in May. That notice, which advertised a public hearing that was held in June, contained information on how people could file a protest after the permit was issued, Andrews said.

“When we published our initial permit notice announcing the draft permit, we included information in that advertisement on that procedure,” Andrews said.

The advertisement was published May 20 in the Henderson Gleaner. The notice directs people who wish to petition against the permit to call Ben Markin of the Division of Air Quality at (502) 573-3382.

“As far as Kentucky is concerned, they’re good to go,” Andrews said of Cash Creek’s permit.

The state will inspect the facility’s emissions control technology to ensure it is in compliance with the permit. Emissions will also be monitored, and the data will be reviewed by the air quality division and the EPA, Andrews said.

John Blair, president of Valley Watch, an Evansville-based environmental group, said he did not know Cash Creek had received its air quality permit. Blair said he was disappointed by the news.

“People who live in northwest Kentucky should get used to the idea that they’re going to be held back into the 19th Century,” Blair said. “Their leaders will never let them come into the 21st Century.”

” … We know Henderson County wants to become Muhlenberg County,” Blair said. “I’m not sure why, but they apparently do, and they want to stake all their fortunes on coal, and the rest of the world is passing them by.”

The plant’s gasification technology will make the electricity it produces more expensive than power from coal-fired plants, Blair contended.

“It is going to be cleaner” than a coal-fired plant, Blair said. “But … it’s going to be awfully hard to sell that power.”

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