2/9/05

ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL COUNCIL GIVES GOVERNOR BLAGOJEVICH AN “F” FOR HANDLING OF COAL-FIRED POWER PLANTS

posted by Vito Mastrangelo, South Central Illinois Green Party

On Tuesday, January 31, 2005, the Illinois Environmental Council issued an environmental report card that gives Governor Blagojevich an “F” grade for his handling of coal-fired power plants. (Reported on its website–www.ilenviro.org; see the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 2/1/05, Section B (Metro St. Louis), page 1.)

This is from the Council’s website: “The Illinois Environmental Council (IEC) and Illinois Environmental Council Education Fund (IECEF) are 30 year-old organizations that promote sound environmental laws and policies, provide a forum for environmentalists and facilitate a statewide activist network. IECEF engages in legislative monitoring and analysis; outreach, organizing and coalition building; and communication and education. IEC performs legislative advocacy and serves as the environmental community's eyes, ears and voice in Springfield.”

Notably, in rural Washington County in south central Illinois, the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency recently approved a permit for Peabody Coal Company to build another coal-fired power plant. The plant would be the biggest built in Illinois in decades, and it will be built on the banks of the Kaskaskia River. That would be just outside the metro-east area of greater St. Louis, where the air is already so polluted that the proposed plant would have had to comply with additional restrictions.

The proposed plant would release up to 26,702 TONS of pollution every year, including soot, sulfuric acid mist, lead, and mercury. The numbers are staggering: 26,702 tons of pollution means the plant will release 6,096 pounds of pollution every hour of every day of every year. Ominously, that includes almost TWO MILLION pounds of soot every year (223 pounds every hour) and 280 pounds of mercury every year. Illinois residents have already been warned about eating fish from Illinois lakes, rivers, and streams, because the waters have been poisoned with mercury pollution. The website of the Illinois chapter of the Sierra Club warns of the problem: “Mercury is believed to cause mental retardation in children whose mothers are exposed to the toxin, primarily through consumption of fish.”

And the plant would use 18 million gallons of water from the Kaskaskia River every day.

But Governor Blagoyevich supports building the new plant.

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service has said it is considering appealing the Illinois EPA’s decision to issue the permit. The Service had recommended against the plan because of its finding that the plant would have an adverse impact–haze and acid rain–on Missouri’s Mingo National Wildlife Refuge. The Service stated that in the history of the office, it had issued only two adverse impact conclusions, out of 40 to 45 permits issued every year since the early 1980s. (See the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 27, 2005.)

Further south in Illinois, Illinois lawmakers are lobbying the new U.S. Department of Energy Secretary for yet another new coal-fired power plant–the FutureGen project, a multimillion dollar, 275 megawatt plant. Interestingly, one lawmaker stated that the FutureGen project is designed to produce zero emissions. In contrast, Peabody refers to its planned plant as “clean coal technology”.

Even if a coal-fired power plant is necessary–and the evidence is scant that it is–the proposed Peabody plant sells Illinoisans short. It doesn’t use the best technology in its design. It could be cleaner.

On February 2–the day after the Illinois Environmental Council issued its report--Governor Blagoyevich announced that he plans to call for at least 8 percent of the electricity sold in Illinois to come from renewable sources by 2012, nearly half of which would come from wind turbines.

Maybe someday–soon, we hope–clean wind power will help Illinois lose its status as the state with the most spent nuclear fuel stored within its borders--the fuel is intensely radioactive. (See the Chicago Tribune, February 6, 2005.)

If we can get wind power up and running to that extent so quickly, then we don’t need new coal-fired, polluting power plants. Those coal-fired power plants will take years to build.

Contact the Governor; contact your elected local representatives. Illinois residents don’t need more pollution.