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Monday, July 12, 2004

Environment - Stories Today

"EPA cites Indiana power plant" reports this AP story, just posted on the Indianapolis Star site. Some quotes:

CHICAGO -- U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has cited four American Electric Power plants in EPA Region 5 -- three in Ohio and one in Indiana -- for alleged clean-air violations.

In Ohio, EPA cited the Muskingum River Power Plant in Waterford; the Conesville Power Plant in Conesville; and the Cardinal Power Plant in Brilliant. In Indiana, EPA cited the Tanners Creek Power Plant in Lawrenceburg. The agency also cited three AEP power plants in West Virginia, which is in EPA Region 3.

EPA alleges American Electric Power modified the plants without getting permits designed to restrict their air pollutant emissions. Companies must get permits that restrict emissions from their plants before they can modify them in ways that increase emissions if the plants are located in areas that already comply with all national outdoor air-quality standards. These permits are designed to prevent deterioration of air quality in areas with clean air.

EPA alleges the violations have resulted in the release of massive amounts of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and particulate matter (soot) into the environment.

This morning's Star has an editorial about Cinergy's Gibson Power Plant that begins:
Nearly 8,000 residents in Mount Carmel, Ill., are suffering the unintended consequences of a $600-million effort to control nitrogen oxide emissions at Indiana's largest electric power plant.

Under certain weather or plant conditions, bluish clouds of sulfuric acid from one of the smokestacks at the Gibson Power Plant drift across the Wabash River, enveloping Mount Carmel in an irritating haze. It has been happening since selective catalytic reduction units, designed to substantially reduce nitrogen oxide emissions on two generators, went into operation this summer.

Although Cinergy officials who operate the plant near Princeton say preliminary testing doesn't indicate that levels of sulfuric acid in the haze pose a health threat, they take the problem seriously. Cinergy has tried temporary measures to reduce the pollutant while looking for answers as to why it's happening with only two generators -- not all five. The utility also is searching for long-term engineering solutions.

More severe problems at a massive coal-fired power plant in Ohio prompted American Electric Power to buy the entire neighboring town of Cheshire, and move its residents away. Cinergy officials don't think such drastic measures will be necessary in Mount Carmel, which has about four times the population of Cheshire.

The Star had a story this morning about Pete Drum, a retired engineer who:
maintains a Web site that contains monthly measures of bacterial contamination in the river -- courtesy of Indianapolis' Office of Environmental Services. Although the site doesn't get a lot of traffic, it attracts local activists, journalists, city contractors and politicians, Drum said. * * *

Drum joined Friends of White River, a nonprofit group to protect the river, a few months after it formed in 1985. But he says the majority of his environment-related activities didn't begin until after he retired in 1996.

Drum that year became interested in obtaining data on E-Coli levels in White River. Living by the river had inspired him, Drum said, and he hoped to get the information from the city. The response was emphatic and unambiguous:

"Stone wall, stone wall, stone wall," Drum said. "I was trying to get data and having a devil of a time."

But then an article in the newspaper described Drum's plight. "Bang, bang, within two days, people were having large meetings with me and handing me data, and I was appointed to this Wet Weather Technical Advisory Committee," Drum said.

"Nature lobbyist Dustin mourned statewide" is the headline to this story today in the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel:
Longtime local environmentalists Tom and Jane Dustin might be better remembered for their vocal and sometimes fierce efforts to protect the environment. But the Huntertown-area couple also tried to interest new generations of people in safeguarding natural resources and to prepare those converts for the battles lying ahead.

Early Friday, Tom Dustin passed the torch -- and the challenge -- to those new generations when he died after an extended illness. Arrangements are pending; his age and place of death were unavailable late Friday.

His death came seven months after the death of his wife in November.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 12, 2004 03:19 PM
Posted to Environmental Issues