Clean Air in the News

A host of environmental groups have asked N.C. regulators to modify or revoke a permit for Duke Energy's expanded Cliffside power plant.

The groups, represented by the Southern Environmental Law Center, said a federal court ruling last month means the permit should be reopened. The coal-burning plant is 50 miles west of Charlotte.

In a petition Wednesday to the N.C. Division of Air Quality, they argue that further study is needed on whether the plant will use the best available controls on mercury and other hazardous air pollutants.

The law center says two dozen other U.S. facilities operate with stronger pollution controls than Cliffside, which will get a new 800-megawatt boiler.

"The (N.C.) Division of Air Quality must now go back and do its homework by first identifying the highest achievable level of control for this hazardous pollutant and then requiring Duke to implement it," law-center attorney Gudrun Thompson said in a statement.

The air-quality agency has not decided whether to reopen the permit, said Diana Kees, spokeswoman for the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources. "We will be taking (the petition) under consideration," she said.

Duke, which has said it is using the best mercury technology available, has already begun work on the $1.8 billion project.

State officials had cut the amount of mercury Cliffside may release before issuing an air permit for the plant Jan. 29. Cliffside's permit already controls mercury well enough that additional analysis would not significantly change anything, the air quality division has said.

The plant now emits 157 pounds of mercury a year. The new permit caps the release at 99 pounds a year, although Duke says actual emissions will range from 70 to 80 pounds.

Mercury is hotly debated because its most toxic form, methymercury, can accumulate in fish and pass to people who eat fish.

N.C. authorities estimate that more than 13,000 infants a year could face developmental problems because their mothers ate tainted fish. State fish-consumption advisories are in effect for certain fish species caught east of Interstate 85, and statewide for largemouth bass.

Cliffside also needs review for 66 other pollutants affected by the court ruling, the petitioners say, including hydrochloric acid, arsenic and heavy metals.

In a Feb. 8 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia overturned 2005 federal rules that removed power plants from sources whose toxic emissions, including mercury, are most tightly regulated. North Carolina later adopted a version of those rules.

Wednesday's petitioners

Environment North Carolina; Environmental Defense; National Parks Conservation Association; Natural Resources Defense Council; N.C. Waste Awareness & Reduction Network; N.C. chapter of the Sierra Club; Southern Alliance for Clean Energy; and Riverkeepers for the Cape Fear, Catawba, Lower Neuse, New, Pamlico-Tar, Upper Neuse, Watauga, Waccamaw and Yadkin rivers, plus the Cape Fear Coastkeeper.