Federal Agency May Appeal Power Plant OK

Jan. 27—Federal wildlife officials are considering appealing a permit for a proposed power plant in Southern Illinois that they believe will harm the air at Missouri's Mingo National Wildlife Refuge.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials said they stand behind a finding issued in May that Peabody Energy Co.'s proposed Prairie State power plant near Marissa would cause haze and acid rain at the Mingo refuge, an ancient cypress swamp in southeastern Missouri.

Illinois officials recently approved the plant's air pollution permit, marking one of the few times that a state has issued an air permit over the objections of federal land managers. In two decades, only a handful of permits have been issued against a so-called "adverse impact" finding.

"In the history of this office, we've only issued two adverse impact conclusions. We review 40 to 45 permits a year, ever since the early '80s," said Sandra Silva, head of the Fish and Wildlife Service's air quality branch. "We're very disappointed we couldn't work this out."

Illinois officials said they believed that the plant would not harm Mingo, which lies about 85 miles away. Laurel Kroack, acting director of the air bureau at the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, said the state negotiated extensively with the Fish and Wildlife Service before issuing the final permit Jan. 14.

"We came to the conclusion that we had negotiated as far as we were going to," Kroack said. "We had a fundamental disagreement, and we weren't going to get past it."

Federal land advocates said such conflicting decisions threaten to further degrade national treasures such as the Grand Canyon, the Everglades and the Great Smoky Mountains. Congress gave 156 national parks, forests and wilderness areas special air quality protection in 1977, but dirty air still hangs over most of the sites.

"The Class 1 areas are supposed to have the highest protection from air pollution of any place in the known universe. They, in fact, have some of the highest levels of pollution in the country," said Don Barger of the National Parks Conservation Association, a nonprofit organization based in Knoxville, Tenn. "The Class 1 areas of this nation will never be protected unless state agencies that permit new sources choose to participate in their protection."

Illinois officials tightened permit requirements in response to concerns outlined in a letter May 14 from Interior Department Assistant Secretary Paul Hoffman.

"We offered changes in the permit that were mitigating measures, and we hoped that they would accept them," Kroack said.

Wildlife Service officials said the changes were not adequate.

"They haven't provided any substantial changes to the permit that would change our mind about the conclusion we reached," said Tim Allen, a meteorologist with the Fish and Wildlife Service's air quality branch in Denver.

The Wildlife Service has 30 days to decide whether to file an administrative appeal with the state of Illinois.

Peabody's plant, situated 40 miles southeast of St. Louis, may emit up to 11,866 tons a year of sulfur dioxide, which creates haze, acid rain and fine particle pollution that harms the heart and lungs. It also could emit 4,564 tons of nitrogen oxides, which cause smog, acid rain, and fine particle pollution; 7,824 tons of carbon monoxide, which affects the heart and central nervous system; and 280 pounds of mercury, a neurotoxin.

The main concern for Mingo is visibility. The refuge, like many national parks, suffers from haze that obscures distant views. Faraway objects like mountains look fuzzy because of tiny particles in the air that scatter light.

The haze comes from regional air pollution. The same pollutants also cause serious human health problems.

According to federal data, Mingo is already one of the haziest wildlife refuges in the Class 1 system. On a map showing haze levels nationwide, Mingo appears in a high-haze bull's-eye that stretches from southern Missouri to Alabama.

Under the Clean Air Act, the National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service are supposed to protect the 156 Class 1 areas from the effects of manmade pollution. Federal land managers review proposed power plants and other new air pollution sources and that could affect the sites, but their approval is not required to issue a permit.

In the case of the Prairie State power plant, the state and the federal agency strongly disagree on the impact of the plant's expected air emissions.

Illinois officials concurred with computer models and data provided by Peabody's contractors that showed the effect on Mingo would be negligible.

Federal wildlife officials, using a standardized computer model shared by all the federal land managers, found a significant problem.

Allen, the meteorologist, said his modeling showed some days with an 80 percent change in light extinction, a measure of visibility impairment. When Peabody's contractors followed the federal model closely, they found 12 days in a three-year period with a significant visibility change, according to the agency's letter May 14.

Illinois officials let Peabody change the model to make it more lenient, subtracting effects that occurred at night when the refuge is closed, for example. "When you make the adjustments we feel are appropriate, you have one day in three years" with a noticeable visibility change, Kroack said.

Barger, who tracks visibility issues, said tinkering with the model affects the outcome. "In other words, they didn't like the answer, so they changed the question," he said.

The state and federal officials also disagreed about pollution controls.

The Wildlife Service wanted Peabody to take two steps to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions. One was a process called coal washing, a common method of removing about 20 percent to 30 percent of sulfur and other impurities from the fuel. The second step was adding a baghouse, a type of filter.

Peabody said neither control was feasible. Company spokesman Vic Svec said washing coal is expensive and creates liquid and solid waste. "It has its own environmental costs," he said.

As for the baghouse, Svec said the company chose another method to remove sulfur — a high-efficiency scrubber that will remove 98 percent of the pollutant.

The federal agency argued that all of these technologies should be required because the plant would be allowed to use high-sulfur Illinois coal. "The facility should be held to the strictest standards to protect public health and the environment," the agency's letter May 14 said.

Spokesmen for the National Park Service and the U.S. Forest Service had a hard time recalling instances in which an air pollution permit was issued over their objections. Typically, state and federal authorities work together to resolve any concerns.

"In a well-run process, you don't get to the point of saying no. You negotiate to the point where you can say yes," said Rich Fisher, national air program manager for the Forest Service.

John Bunyak, permit manager for the National Park Service, could recall only a few disputes out of hundreds of proposed projects.

Kathleen Burchett, manager of the Mingo refuge, said she was concerned that the Prairie State power plant decision would set a precedent. She's serious about her responsibility to protect the air around Mingo, a swamp thick with tupelo trees, snakes and tropical birds.

"Yes, it's for the environment, but it's for people's health and well-being also," she said. "We are all connected."

© 2005, St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.