|
-
|
Dominion's plans for Wise aren't green
Date published: 5/13/2008
On April 25 and May 1, The Free Lance-Star published a full-page ad from Dominion Virginia Power touting its "new clean-coal carbon capture-compatible power station in Wise County" with "the very latest in emissions-control systems."
The environmentally friendly power plant that Dominion describes is little more than a fairy tale.
The Wise County plant would emit 5.4 million tons a year of heat-trapping carbon--as much as all the cars on the road in metro Richmond.
Dominion's permit application to the state includes plans to designate a patch of empty land near the plant to build carbon-capture technology--someday.
Noting that not one penny of the plant's $1.8 billion cost would be invested in carbon-capture technology, the State Corporation Commission said the plant was, in its words, a "conventional coal facility."
Dominion itself conceded as much by withdrawing its request for special financial incentives for carbon-capture-compatible facilities.
Another of the company's fairy tales is the "very latest in emissions-control systems."
Dominion and its lawyers are pushing for a permit from the Department of Environmental Quality that would allow it to violate federal hazardous-pollutant standards.
The plant would emit more than 40 times as much mercury as the newest comparable plant, and four times as much as its Clover plant, built in the mid-1990s.
Dominion has refused to consider advanced mercury-control technology in use in the U.S. and Europe.
With full-page ads in this and most major dailies in Virginia, as well as in The Washington Post, Dominion has spent untold dollars on a green-washing campaign to paint itself as an environmental leader. Don't believe it.
Sarah C. Rispin
Charlottesville
The writer is staff attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center.
Date published: 5/13/2008
Most recent reader comments:
Getting the truth out
(posted by
JTravisR
, May 14, 2008 8:51 am)
Yes, Ranko, the SELC and every other envionmentally concerned individual knows the answers to our power needs. Here are a few - conservation, efficiency, geothermal, solar, wind. Need more? Every power company in the country knows these as well. The problem is that most of them, like Dominion, just want to do business as usual, even though it is killing us. We don't need more coal, just forward thinkers. The real question is, how will the coal supporters justify themselves in light of the truth.
please!
(posted by
stick
, May 13, 2008 6:02 pm)
I live in Wise County and we already have one a power plant in our area...it is the number two source of pollution in Virginia and will be just 9 miles from the new one that Dominion wants to build. My county has already had 25% of its mountains blown up for coal to power these plants. I want to thank Ms Rispin for her letter and ask Seadragon and Ranko to please conserve energy so my children do not have to breath polluted air and drink polluted water to power their computers. Wind works! look at Texas
isn't mercury bad?
(posted by
mikester
, May 13, 2008 3:23 pm)
I thought mercury was poisonious in minute amounts. If a thermometer breaks don't they practically close the school?
Who's fairy tale??
(posted by
Ranko
, May 13, 2008 7:55 am)
Who would have thought it a lawyer trying to make a point about something that she know very little about. Does the Southern Enviromental Law Center have an answer to our present and future power needs? Let's hear it. I know every power company in the country will be waiting for your answer.
WTF K
(posted by
Seadragon
, May 13, 2008 7:34 am)
I bet the writer benefits from the very energy that Dominion provides. Hot showers, warm/cool house, dishwasher, clothes washer/dryer, and etc. Then she complains about mercury. The new lights bulbs that we are all supposed to use have mercury in them. Get a life.
|
Star Directory
