Last week, Governor Milorad “Rod” Blagojevich played rock-star to cheering high school students. Flanked by coal industry executives, he touted his plan for a new Illinois coal-fired power plant.
www.southernillinoisan.com/articles/2005/02/08/top/doc4208ba0e393cf363520988.prt. Rod buzzed about the 450 new permanent jobs and brushed aside the additional 25,000 tons of toxic chemicals bound for our air.
illinois.sierraclub.org/conservation/cleanair/pages/coal-burning/peabody.htm.
If anybody sees Elvis, please tell him this month of February, 2005, marked the first-ever wintertime alert for dirty air in Chicago, causing additional health problems for many, thanks in large part to coal-fired power plants, including the two in Chicago.
www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0502030255feb03,0,341123.story. Tell Elvis that this past December the EPA declared two thirds of all Illinois residents to be living in areas that fail to meet minimal federal health standards for air quality, same for the greater St. Louis and Metro East area next to where he proposes to put the new coal-fired power plant, and that he is making matters worse.
www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-soot16.html.
Dirty Power’s Influence on ILEPA
Last month, Blagojevich’s Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (ILEPA) granted St. Louis based Peabody Energy, the world’s largest coal company (formerly know as Peabody Coal Company, infamous in A People’s History of the United States [Zinn- chapter 19] for ruthless strip mining of sacred Indian land in the late 1960’s) a permit to pollute.
illinois.sierraclub.org/news/050117pr.html. During the process, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service said the proposed Prairie State Energy Campus would have an “adverse impact” on the Mingo National Wildlife Refuge (Mingo, formed 18,000 years ago when the Mississippi River shifted to the east, is an ancient bottomland swamp in southeastern Missouri famous for its blackwater bayous, where canoeists and wild birds flock amid cypress and tupelo trees), only the third time in 20 years such an alarming report was issued. In response, the ILEPA relied on computer models submitted by Peabody Energy to show their additional emissions would not harm the air at Mingo. Likewise, the ILEPA relies on Peabody Energy’s analysis that coal gasification, a preferred process that burns much cleaner than Peabody’s proposed method, is not yet ready for commercial application
www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/AF5A2426868F886B86256F8D001942FF.
Seemingly unbeknownst to ILEPA, American Electric Power in Columbus, Ohio, plans to build at least one commercially clean Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) plant by 2010 and Cinergy, in Cincinnati, said in December it also would build a clean IGCC plant.
www.csmonitor.com/2004/1223/p01s04-sten.html
The ILEPA’s reliance on Peabody Energy’s analysis to grant the permit to pollute is consistent with its past reliance on the power industry in determining environmental and public health standards. In September, 2004, the ILEPA decided to leave regulations of Illinois’ 23 dirty-old coal fired power plants to the Bush controlled federal EPA. The decision broke a pledge to set new standards Blagojevich made during his campaign to be governor
www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/metroeast/story/D27E865756154F0086256F9B00181226+. The inaction is a boon to the dirty-power industry (Gary L. Rainwater, chairman, CEO and president of Ameren Corporation that operates five of Illinois’ dirty 23, while last week announcing net income of $530,000,000, attributed the positive news to “the excellent performance of our low-cost coal-fired power plants. The performance of these plants reduced our average generating cost per megawatthour and allowed us to take advantage of strong power prices in the energy markets through the sale of our excess generation,”
www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl=, in other words, it pays to pollute- and the fact that there is “excess generation,” calls into question the need for a new coal-fired power plant).
Why has this happened?
Maybe because, as reported last week in Crain's Chicago Business (“Color of money, Even as the guv woos green voters, he's accepting lots o' green from polluters,” Greg Hinz, 02/07/2005) that just prior to the ILEPA punt to Washington favorable to the power industry and its granting Peabody Energy the permit to pollute, the power industry gave the Governor nearly $100,000. Most of it came from Chicago’s own Midwest Generation (who had hired the Governor’s top lawyer, Deborah Golden, in July, 2004). Midwest Generation operates the two plants in Chicago and four others in Illinois, is a wholly owned subsidiary of California based Edison International which netted $821,000,000 in 2003 with up sales in 2004
www.edison.com/investors/ext_quote.asp'. ILEPA Director Renee Cipriano concedes her September "recommendation" for ILEPA to do nothing about Illinois’ dirty 23 was “reviewed upstairs before being issued.” This unfortunate series of events echoes what happened at the federal level. A report issued earlier this month by the EPA Inspector General Nikki Tinsley concluded that the federal EPA staff had been instructed to set lowered limits on emissions from coal-fired power plants (specifically Mercury, a neurotoxin that causes brain damage) and then produce justification for their substandard plan. Among other things, the Inspector General said the EPA failed "to fully assess the rule's impact on children's health” and echoed concerns raised by the National Academy of Sciences, that cap-and-trade plans the EPA proposes could create "hot spots" in parts of the country, like Chicago, where dirty-old coal-fired power plants are located.
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi, also
www.epa.gov/oig/index.htm
Blagojevich as Pollutocrat
The same process and system the Inspector General blasts the EPA for is what Governor Blagojevich and his ILEPA rely upon to deal with the detrimental public health effects of the sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxide (NOx) and mercury (HG) of dirty-old coal-fired power plants in Illinois.
www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0502150291feb15,1,6840741.story. Like the Bush Administration, the Blagojevich administration ignores science that shows national and even regional caps will not help those living around dirty-old coal-fired power plants. Pollution on the rise:
www.cleartheair.org/proactive/newsroom/release.vtml
Governor Blagojevich should follow the model recommended by over 90% of his closest neighbors in the November elections. They overwhelmingly told him to reduce power plant toxic emissions of SO2, NOX and HG from the two dirty-old coal-fired power plants in Chicago by 90% from 1990 levels by no later than 2009. Precinct 28 ward 33:
www.suntimes.com/elections/results/cst/chicago.html
Unfortunately, Governor Blagojevich is addicted to coal to the detriment of his family and neighbors. While existing coal plants are Illinois’ largest sources of air pollution, out of the 100 new coal-burning plants proposed for the entire nation, 12 of them are planned for Illinois. Also, the Governor is promising Peabody Energy, who last year netted $175,000,000
phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml=, with state financing of between $300,000,000 and $1,700,000,000 for the new plant (construction expected to begin later this year and pollution to begin in full by 2010. Note: the day after Irl F. Engelhardt, chief executive officer with Peabody Energy appeared at Elvis’s side, Peabody Energy announced it had contracted to sell much of the new cheap energy to citizens in Illinois’ neighboring states
www.stltoday.com/stltoday/business/stories.nsf/0/2C32F911EA09737A86256FA4001307C4).
Taxpayer subsidizing of coal-fired power plants, without regard to the total economic costs paid by taxpayers, is an abomination for a politician who claims to be a Democratic environmentalist that cares about his family and neighbors.
The public health effects of Illinois 23 existing dirty-old coal-fired power plants:
Deaths: 1,356 per Year
Heart Attacks: 2,361 per Year
Lung Cancer Deaths: 156 per Year
Asthma Attacks: 33,986 per Year
Hospital Admissions: 1,333 per Year
Chronic Bronchitis: 974 per Year
Asthma ER Visits: 2,007 per Year
power plant pollution locator:
www.cleartheair.org
Evidently, Governor Blagojevich appears to count the money spent on the above, added to the cost of extreme weather from coal-fired power plant’s massive emissions of the chief global warming gas, carbon dioxide, as positive economic activity we need more of. It appears only a friendly intervention can cure him of his addiction.
Better Than Coal
Illinois ranks just 34th in the nation in energy efficiency spending for programs such as rebates for energy efficient products, and energy education of consumers and small business owners. Illinois spends only 33 cents per capita on energy efficiency investment, well under the national average of $3.88 per capita. By increasing funding to at least the national average, Illinois could cut energy consumption by one-third, create new jobs, and reduce air pollution.
www.blackoutsolutions.org/summary.htm.
Currently, only one-half of one percent of Illinois’ energy comes from renewable sources, compared to 12 percent in California. A healthier environment and more jobs can be gained focusing on developing renewable sources of energy rather than coal. For instance, Illinois is the only state with two solar panel production facilities, both in Chicago, Spire Solar Chicago and Solargenix, and is home to the Midwest’s leading retail installer of solar collectors, Solar Service of Niles.
Mayor Richard M. Daley
It would be unfair to leave all the blame for the death and destruction from dirty-power in Chicago on the Governor’s doorstep. Chicago ranks as the second hardest hit city in the entire country for the impacts of power plant pollution. The damage from the Fisk and Crawford power plants in Pilsen and Little Village are responsible for:
40 premature deaths,
2,800 asthma attack and
550 emergency room visits each year.
Richard M. Daley has been mayor since 1989. Take the above and multiply by 16 and show it to Mayor Daley and his 50 Alderpersons. Mayor Daley is proud to showoff his City Hall rooftop grass to display his idea of environmental justice. It would be nice for him to stop looking at his reflection in the bean and do something about the dirty smokestacks making his neighbors sick all of these years.
Contact Info:
Governor Blagojevich:
Phone: 312-814-2121
Fax: 312-814-5512
www.illinois.gov/gov/contactthegovernor.cfm
Mayor Daley
Phone 312.744.4000
Fax: 312.744.8045
egov.cityofchicago.org/city/webportal/portalPreContactUsAction.do