As Chicago gasps through another summer of dirty air, the state's top attorney is accusing environmental regulators of looking the other way while the region's coal-fired power plants repeatedly fill the air with soot.
As Chicago gasps through another summer of dirty air, the state's top attorney is accusing environmental regulators of looking the other way while the region's coal-fired power plants repeatedly fill the air with soot.
A scathing letter to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency from Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan's office documents more than 7,600 pollution violations since 1999 at six plants owned by Midwest Generation, including two in Chicago and three in the suburbs.
Monitoring equipment registered the violations of state limits on opacity, or the amount of light blocked by coal smoke. The EPA is supposed to use the information to gauge whether coal plants are releasing too much pollution that can trigger asthma attacks and cause lung disease, heart problems and premature deaths.
Despite the violations, EPA officials say there isn't a problem at the Chicago-area coal plants. They agree with company executives who contend the occasional bursts of dirty smoke are normal and nothing to worry about.
Madigan's office, though, is accusing the EPA of skirting a "clear, absolute and non-discretionary requirement of federal law."
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The attorney general wants Chicago-based Midwest Generation to agree to clean up the aging plants, some of which were built five decades ago, before the EPA grants the company new air-pollution permits.
"That these violations occurred is indisputable," Ann Alexander, Madigan's environmental counsel, wrote in an Aug. 1 letter to the EPA, a copy of which was obtained by the Tribune.
"Principles of sound law enforcement do not generally counsel excusing violators because they deny the violations occurred, especially when their self-reported compliance data admits to thousands of violations," Alexander wrote.
Coal plants are major sources of chemicals that mix in the atmosphere to create smog. They also release microscopic particulate matter, commonly known as soot, which researchers and regulators consider a significant threat to public health.
EPA officials say every power plant, factory and refinery violates opacity limits from time to time. The violations tend to be brief and don't happen often enough to merit taking enforcement action, according to the agency.
"Merely because they've had intermittent opacity violations doesn't mean they have excess emissions," said Laurel Kroack, chief of the EPA's Air Bureau. "Is a portion of it perhaps [soot]? Yes. But it also could just be water vapor."
Testy exchanges between the EPA and the attorney general's office are the latest sign of tension between Madigan and Gov. Rod Blagojevich, both Democrats.
Among other things, her office is investigating allegations that Blagojevich's administration awarded positions on state boards in return for campaign contributions. The two elected officials also have sparred over plans to award a casino license to suburban Rosemont and the governor's attempt to raise cash for the state by mortgaging the Thompson Center in the Loop.
Accusations that Blagojevich's EPA is ignoring pollution violations at Chicago-area coal plants come during another summer of warnings about dirty air.
Cook County and surrounding counties have violated the federal standard for ground-level ozone, or smog, 15 days so far this summer, according to monitoring data. The worst day was June 27, when air pollution was so bad that the region exceeded limits for both smog and soot.
Smokestack monitors that measure opacity help regulators ensure that power plants are complying with the Clean Air Act. Frequent violations can be a sign that a plant is releasing too much soot.
Of the six plants cited by the attorney general's office, two in Will County were the worst offenders, recording about 63 percent of the 7,613 opacity violations measured from 1999 to 2004.
The company's Waukegan plant had 1,181 violations during the same period; a plant outside Peoria recorded 1,138.
Two Chicago coal plants, Fisk in Pilsen and Crawford in Little Village, combined for 512.
More recent data have yet to be compiled, but the attorney general's office said an initial review shows continued problems.
Both the company and the EPA say the power plants routinely pass occasional tests that look specifically for soot blowing out of the smokestacks. The attorney general's office says that only proves the company does "what is necessary to prepare for a stack test to ensure that they pass the [soot] and opacity requirements."
Half of the violations cited by the attorney general were five percentage points higher than the state limit for opacity. About 11 percent of the violations were more than twice the limit.
"We think that's a pretty good indication there is a problem," Alexander said.
Midwest Generation, a subsidiary of California-based Edison International, purchased the plants from Commonwealth Edison in 1999 and sells the electricity on the open market.
Although none of the power is sold directly to Illinois utilities, the company said the plants help maintain the reliability of the electrical grid in the Chicago area.
Doug McFarlan, a Midwest Generation spokesman, said the company's opacity violations account for just a 10th of a percent of the time the plants are operating. Citing information compiled by the EPA, he said the six power plants do a better job of limiting violations than most other coal plants in Illinois.
"We think our performance in this area is excellent," he said.
Doug Scott, a former Rockford mayor and state lawmaker who recently was named EPA director, said he met last week with Madigan in an attempt to resolve the dispute.
The agency will keep a close eye on the six plants, Scott said, but it doesn't plan to require Midwest Generation to reduce opacity violations in order to receive new permits. No other state has placed such conditions on power plants, he said.
"We are not doing something that is way out of line," he said.
But critics say allowing repeated violations at the Midwest Generation plants is like a police officer letting speeding motorists escape a ticket because they insist they normally follow the speed limit.
"The regulatory requirement is for continuous compliance, not compliance most of the time, and the sources have violated it many thousands of times," Alexander wrote in her letter to the EPA.
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Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
