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Sorry for all the cussing today, but you wanna talk about a sentence that just hits you in the face:
China, South Africa and India host the world's five dirtiest utility companies in terms of global warming pollution, according to the first-ever worldwide database of power plants' carbon dioxide emissions, while a single Southern Co. plant in Juliette, Ga., emits more annually than Brazil's entire power sector.
That would be Georgia Power's Plant Scherer, which is just north of Macon.
The story's from The Washington Post. Thanks to Neill Herring for sending it my way.
UPDATE: From Jeff Wilson, a Georgia Power spokesman:
Plant Scherer emits more carbon dioxide than any power plant in the U.S. because it's the single largest coal fired plant in the U.S. The more coal fired generation there is, the more CO2 that would be emitted. There's currently no industry technology that will reduce carbon dioxide, but we're continuing to look for technologies that will do just that. ... Coal generation is one of the cheapest sources of electricity.
We're going to invest $2 billion in the next 3 year (statewide)... to install additional environmental controls.
8 comments:
Goodness! Firstly, Plant Schearer is spelled Plant Scherer, but no big deal. Plant Scherer's spokesman, Jeff Wilson, and his comments, however, are a big deal! The "controls" that he is touting won't be online at Scherer until the year 2015 even though the technology has been available for years. The end result is that the controls are planned to bring Scherer up to the MINIMUM standards for clean air and not above. He also said, "there's currently no industry technology that will reduce carbon dioxide," but I would refer you to this web site, one of many that begs to differ with Scherer's "expert."
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/mar2006/2006-03-15-06.asp
Unfortunately the EPA does not recognize carbon dioxide as a pollutant, although in April the Supreme Court deemed it should be so.
Wilson also neglected to mention that Plant Scherer is the largest emitter of mercury- 1700 lbs.last year, to be exact- of any industry (not just power plants)in Georgia! Over 700,000 babies are born at risk of mercury poison every year in the United States. Macon and Bibb County have two fish advisories for the Ocmulgee River, the source of our drinking water, for mercury and PCBs. Lake Tobosofkee has one for PCBs.
At the Montana Coal Plant where Scherer buys its coal, Scherer has its own train loop, affectionately named, "The Scherer Loop" because of the quantity of coal shipped to the Juliette plant. Only recently have they switched to a harder composition coal which is less polluting than the one environmentalists had asked them to switch to for years.
Lastly, I will just mention that Michael Chang, Georgia Tech professor, and lead investigator for the Fall Line Air Quality Study, told a public meeting a few years ago, "you could take all the cars out of Bibb County, and Bibb County will still be in non-attainment"! When asked why, he replied, "Because of the 800 lb. gorilla in the room, Plant Scherer"!
20-25% of the power produced by Plant Scherer is sold to Florida. They get the power and we get the pollutions. I'll save the NOX and SOX pollution produced by Plant Scherer for another day. Just writing this much makes me want to begin cussing worse than Travis.
They say that - "Coal generation is one of the cheapest sources of electricity."
But it is the Most Expensive to our citizenry as it sickens Americans by the thousands!
Newcomers to Macon wonder why they all of a sudden "develop allergies for the 1st time in their lives".
It ain't because of pollen, folks.
It is particulates from Scherer.... sometimes the particulate pollution is reported daily here:
http://airnow.gov/index.cfm?action=airnow.showlocal&CityID=393
Go here for more worldwide bad press on this giant of all power plant polluters, right in our back yard!
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article3166414.ece
Whoops! The last part of the url was cut off of my last post. Here is the full site address: http://news.independent.co.uk/
world/americas/article3166414.ece
Pretty embarrassing if you ask me.
Not to disagree with my good friend Lindsay, but Plant Scherer's CO2 does contribute to pollen and pulmonary distress in Bibb County citizens. Carbon Dioxide, through interaction with sunlight and a process known as photosynthesis, is the fuel that makes plants and trees grow. The more carbon dioxide the faster they grow, especially weeds which produce pollen. High counts of pollen exacerbate pulmonary distress in allergic people and creates critical medical problems for Asthmatics. Up until a few years ago, the Medical Center did not have an Asthma Clinic. They do now, but Bibb County's population has grown by less than 1/4% per year for the last 20 years. For the last three years, according to the U.S. Census, we have had negative growth! So if we have less people, but more asthmatics, what is the cause?
Here is some information on asthma:
Asthma is a major public health problem of increasing concern in the United States. From 1980 to 1996, asthma prevalence among children increased by an average of 4.3% per year, from 3.6% to 6.2%. Low-income populations, minorities, and children living in inner cities experience disproportionately higher morbidity and mortality due to asthma. Asthma’s effects on children and adolescents include the following:
* Asthma accounts for 14 million lost days of school missed annually.
* Asthma is the third-ranking cause of hospitalization among those younger than 15 years of age.
* The number of children dying from asthma increased almost threefold from 93 in 1979 to 266 in 1996.
* The estimated cost of treating asthma in those younger than 18 years of age is $3.2 billion per year.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/11/16/5267/
Article on links between GW.Bush, the Repubs and Plant Scherer.
No surprises. Just same old greed pissing on everyone else in Creation...
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/11/16/5267/
Article on links between GW.Bush, the Repubs and Plant Scherer.
No surprises. Just same old greed pissing on everyone else in Creation...
Some of the environmetalist radicals sicken me with their rhetoric about "killer" Plant Scherer (as spewed by reporter S. Heather Duncan). How much is the technology going to cost customers regardless of how long it has been around?
Let's see if we can make nuclear power cheaper. One of the N-plants in Georgia is working on an upgrade per the New York Times Magazine. Regulate them but don't harass them. Of course the weirdbeards won't like more nuclear plants either.
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