By Gail Ryba

From Rio Grande Sierran, July/August 2008

On May 13, Susan Martin, the Rio Grande Chapter chair, and I, along with lawyers and scientists from the New Mexico Environment Department and other environmental advocates and citizens concerned about pollution at our coal plants, visited the San Juan Generating Station (SJGS), about 30 miles west of Farmington. We were there to tour the environmental improvements that have been made at SJGS since PNM agreed to settle a lawsuit in 2004 brought by the Sierra Club and the Grand Canyon Trust for thousands of violations of air quality. If you’ve driven along the highway west of Farmington, you’ve probably noticed the tall smokestacks and clouds of steam flowing from the SJGS power plant to the north of the highway, or the similar smokestacks on the south side of the road at the nearby Four Corners Power Plant. Both power plants feed power to New Mexico residents, as well as to nearby states, and they both run on coal from mines next door to the plants. But unless you’ve driven the few miles up to the gates of the power plants, you may not appreciate the size of these power plants that, combined, generate enough electricity for all of New Mexico. (Although, in reality, some of their power goes elsewhere, while New Mexico is served partially by a nuclear plant in Arizona and several gas-fired power plants and a wind farm in New Mexico.) On our tour, we climbed four or five flights of stairs in several places and walked along steel catwalks in order to peer into the inner workings of the new pollution controls. It wasn’t a place for those afraid of heights. We wore ear protection to safeguard us from the deafening din of this large industrial machine that was burning, pumping, grinding, whining, hissing, and clanging as coal was conveyed into the burners, while motors and fans turned everywhere. The ear protection made it difficult to hear the plant manager, Russell Huffman, who served as our tour guide, but the PNM team did an excellent job of answering our questions and explaining how it all worked. Since the settlement in 2004, PNM has designed a cleanup system that it began to install in 2007. The most imposing component of the cleanup equipment is a huge “baghouse,” which filters the exhaust from these huge coal-burning plants. PNM is also installing improved mercury removal systems and NOx reduction systems. The baghouses contain thousands of cloth filters to take out about 99.9% of the particulates from the ash that goes up the chimney. These baghouses improve on the previous electrostatic precipitators that were originally installed, and they enable the power plant to reach the emissions limits in the upcoming new federal standards. Although the plants do still emit some particulates, the power plant emissions are smaller than having lots of smaller biomass power plants scattered around the state. (Cleaner still, however, would be more solar and wind plants.) SJGS has four independent units that can be shut down separately, such that they only have to take onequarter of the power plant offline to do repairs. During fall and spring, there is less demand for electricity, so this kind of maintenance is typically performed in these seasons. In Fall 2007 and in Spring 2008, PNM completed the installation of the baghouse and mercury removal systems on Units 4 and 3, respectively. In Fall 2008 and Spring 2009, they will complete construction at Units 1 and 2, respectively. These improvements are costing around $180 million and will reduce the pollution from NOx, SO2, particulates, and mercury. These pollution reductions will improve public health, no doubt about it. But they will also add slightly to the cost of electricity in New Mexico, by perhaps one-third of a cent per kilowatt-hour, since we will pay for them over 20 or 30 years. This increase is about $1.80 per month for the average New Mexican. Is that price worth it to ensure that dozens of Farmington-area children will not get asthma, and even one child in the region will not suffer from retardation caused by mercury poisoning? I think so, especially because most New Mexicans can cut the “fat” in their electricity use without suffering. Replacing just two high-use incandescent lightbulbs San Juan (continued from page 3) with compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) would save about the same amount that we are spending on pollution controls. And due to PNM energy efficiency programs to reduce the cost of CFLs, those bulbs now cost only about $1 each, so there is also no financial barrier to making the switch to CFLs. Modern CFLs are engineered to provide warm, broad-spectrum light, without the annoying flicker or buzz of years past. And local solid-waste collectors are finally starting to recycle these CFLs. Ultimately, we expect that the coal power plants around the region, and around the world for that matter, will begin to be shut down and replaced with power plants that do not contribute to global warming. The largest utility in Colorado, in fact, has recently agreed to shut down two aging coal plants and replace their output with renewables, energy efficiency, and new natural gas generation. This trend, in fact, makes one wonder if it is reasonable to spend $180 million on pollution controls now, if we plan to close the plant someday soon. However, it is also worth noting that the cost of fueling the power plant may be the greater problem and cost impact. Just supplying coal for the SJGS costs about $130 million per year, which is significantly greater than the new costs attributable to the pollution controls. Touring the SJGS, we were able to see that for a relatively small cost we could get cleaner air and better public health by installing the baghouses. But there is also more to be done. The one pollutant not reduced by these improvements may now be the one posing the ultimate greatest threat – namely, carbon dioxide. My conclusion is that in our struggle to ensure that we protect our planet, we must not be dissuaded by those who say we can’t afford it, or it’s not possible. Simply put, we can’t afford not to. For more info, contact Energy Efficiency Chair —Gail Ryba

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By Andy Bessler

From Rio Grande Sierran, Nov./Dec. 2007

Earlier in 2007, the Sierra Club and others filed suit against EPA demanding they follow through on their promised cleanup of air emissions from the Four Corners Power Plant. Despite voluntary efforts by the managing owner, Arizona Public Service, emissions must be reduced in the San Juan Basin. Our case is now in court with great representation by Matt Kenna of the Western Environmental Law Center.

EPA recently requested a delay in creating a Final Implementation Plan (FIP) that would create the highest standard for reducing harmful air emissions by this 2000-plus-megawatt dirty coal plant. The FIP process is held up while EPA tries to figure out how to handle the FIP in the coming years. Stay tuned and check out our website for court updates!

From Rio Grande Chapter Press Release, Dec. 13, 2006

Farmington, NM—The Sierra Club won a commitment today from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to finalize a pollution control plan for the Four Corners power plant near Farmington, NM.

The Sierra Club’s Rio Grande (NM) Chapter filed suit in Federal Court this past July to force the EPA to develop enforceable pollution limits at the Four Corners plant. Today, the Sierra Club agreed to settle the suit when the EPA committed to issue pollution limits for the Four Corners plant by April 30, 2007. The agreement was lodged today in Federal District Court in Albuquerque, and will become effective upon approval by the Court.

“Our children will breathe easier now that the EPA has finally committed to doing its job,” said John Buchser, chair of the Sierra Club’s Northern Group.

The Four Corners plant is one of the nation’s largest, generating 2400 megawatts of electricity, but also one of the dirtiest in the country. (See About Four Corners Power Plant at right.)

“This is another example of the Sierra Club’s work to improve the air people breathe in the Southwest,” said Susan Martin, chair of the Sierra Club’s Rio Grande Chapter in New Mexico. “Because of the size of the Four Corners plant, and the extraordinary levels of pollution it produces, this settlement, followed by enforcement of the Clean Air Act, will make a big difference to all of our citizens and generations to come.”

Assuming it is approved by the Court, the Four Corners agreement is just one on a list of victories for clean air for the Sierra Club in the Southwest. Last year the Sierra Club’s Rio Grande Chapter settled a lawsuit against PNM’s San Juan power plant, also near Farmington, which resulted in the company committing to a major clean up of emissions from that plant.

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The Four Corners Power Plant is located on the Navajo Nation reservation south of Fruitland, NM. Arizona Public Service Co. owns three of the coal-fired plant's generating units and ownership of the other two is split unequally among Southern California Edison, Arizona Public Service, Public Service Company of New Mexico, Salt River Project, Tucson Electric Power and El Paso Electric.

It was built between 1960 and 1971 and generates 2400 megawatts of electricity. It has been one of the dirtiest plants in the country, emitting over 15 million tons of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, particulates and carbon dioxide annually, along with 590 pounds of toxic mercury. Its nitrogen oxide emissions have exceeded all other power plants in the United States.

Emissions at the plant have gone unregulated since it was built because of past disagreements over whether New Mexico, the Navajo Nation or the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) should have jurisdiction over it. It has been the only power plant in the US operating without a pollution permit.

The EPA took responsibility in 1999 to regulate the plant but never finalized a pollution control plan To correct this situation, the Rio Grande Chapter sued the EPA in July, 2006, to force it to act.

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