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Pollution settlement announced

By Steve Ferris 5 min read

Allegheny Energy signed contracts Thursday for the installation of $550-million sulfur dioxide-reducing scrubbers at its Hatfield’s Ferry Power Station in Monongahela Township resolving a lawsuit that environmental groups filed over alleged air pollution violations. Sulfur dioxide emissions from the coal-burning Hatfield plant will be reduced by approximately 95 percent by 2009 when installation of the scrubber system is complete, according to the Greensburg-based Allegheny Energy.

“I’m very happy about it. We’ve worked very long and hard to get this accomplished,” said Charlotte O’Rourke of Masontown and a plaintiff in Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future’s (PennFuture) lawsuit against the utility. “I think everybody in Masontown will be happy about it.”

The scrubbers at Hatfield and other emission reduction work Allegheny Energy is performing at two power plants in West Virginia will reduce sulfur dioxide emissions by a combined 250,00 tons compared to 2002 levels and reduce mercury emissions, the utility said.

Hatfield’s scrubbers, technically known as flue gas desulfurization equipment, will cut the emissions from its three power-generating units by 145,000 tons a year, Allegheny Energy Chairman, President and CEO Paul J. Evanson said in a press release.

By 2010, the plant will produce 13,600 tons a year, according to the company.

“Installing scrubbers at Hatfield is a major step in meeting our commitment to environmental stewardship,” Evanson said. “With our financial turnaround largely complete, we are now moving aggressively to improve our environmental performance. We will have scrubbers on all of our supercritical coal-fired units by 2009, giving Allegheny one of the cleanest coal fleets in the nation. Environmental stewardship is one of the company’s top priorities.”

Allegheny spokesman David Neurohr said contracts for the design, engineering and construction of the scrubbers were signed Thursday morning in Pittsburgh, but the company has not yet obtained the final permit to install the units from the state Department of Environmental Protection.

He said he believes the 30-day period allotted for the public to comment on the scrubber project has not yet ended and did not know when the permit would be issued or work would begin.

DEP spokesperson Helen Humphries said a draft permit has been issued and was sent to the Environmental Protection Agency on June 30.

The EPA has 45 days to review and comment on the permit and the public has 30 days to comment, she said. The public comment period ends sometime in mid-August.

Humphreys aid sulfur dioxide is “precursor to acid rain.”

“This is a powerful action for health, the environment and jobs in southwestern Pennsylvania,” said Charles McPhedran, senior attorney for PennFuture.

The project at Hatfield will create 350 initial construction jobs and result in additional full-time positions to operate and maintain the scrubbers at the 1,710-megawatt facility, Evanson said.

It also settles a lawsuit filed by Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future (PennFuture) and supported by the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) over alleged “massive air pollution violations.”

PennFuture and EIP said Hatfield is one of the largest sources of particulate pollution in the state and the country’s fourth largest source of sulfur dioxide pollution, and the agreement to install the scrubbers will result in 200 fewer premature deaths and savings of $1.2 billion is health care costs annually.

O’Rourke said Greenpeace helped draw attention to the pollution from the plant two years ago when members of the environmental activist organization climbed one of the 700-foot stacks at Hatfield.

She said she learned about the agreement Wednesday, which was the 16th anniversary of the death of her husband, Donald “PJ” O’Rourke, who died from an uncommon form of cancer.

“Yesterday was the 16th anniversary of when my husband died. So it was a very moving day for me,” O’Rourke said.

Her husband’s death led her to look into the causes of death of other Masontown residents. She said she found that an “uncanny” number of borough residents died from cancer that she suspects was caused by pollution from the plant.

McPhedran said the suit against Allegheny was filed in February 2005 in federal court in Pittsburgh and it alleges violations of the federal Clean Air Act and Pennsylvania’s Air Pollution Control Act.

Since the scrubbers won’t be operational until 2009, the settlement requires Allegheny to take interim steps to reduce particulate pollution, he said.

The power company will install sulfur trioxide injection system that makes fly ash, one of the waste products from burning coal, easier to remove in electrostatic precipitators, according to a PennFuture fact sheet.

Hatfield consumes 9,000 tons of coal a day to generate electricity for hundreds of thousands of customers in Allegheny’s system in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland and Virginia.

The injection system and aggressive maintenance will reduce particulate matter pollution by 1,000 tons to 2,00 tons per year from now through June 30, 2010, according to the fact sheet.

Scrubbers use limestone slurry to remove sulfur dioxide from coal combustion gases.

“Scrubbed” air is released into the atmosphere and calcium sulfate, which is the slurry and the sulfur dioxide, is used to make gypsum for wallboard.

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