PROVIDENCE—The Rhode Island Attorney General’s Office is trying to force the Brayton Point Station power plant to abide by a new ruling forcing it to stop heating up billions of gallons of Taunton River water every day, while at the same time suing, in conjunction with other states, to halt new laxer air pollution regulations recently signed into law by President Bush.
"The fact that a Massachusetts facility discharging into Rhode Island waters claims no responsibility for fouling our environment is absurd and ludicrous," Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch stated. "For far too long, the Brayton Point facility has been sucking in Mount Hope Bay and spitting it back out at great cost to the bay, to the fisheries and to the people of Rhode Island. We are paying too high a price and will not stand for Brayton Point’s inability to operate in a responsible manner, at the expense of our state’s water quality."
The Attorney General’s Office, with the Department of Environmental Management, has filed a Petition to Intervene in the appeal filed by USGen New England in response to stringent new permit requirements set by the Environmental Protection Agency for the operation of the Brayton Point Station.
Both the state’s Petition to Intervene—filed Dec. 22—and Brayton Point’s appeal have been filed with the Environmental Appeals Board in Washington, D.C.
USGen New England, the owners of Brayton Point, filed its appeal Nov. 5 in response to a final permit issued by EPA Oct. 6. The state’s Petition to Intervene responds to several issues specific to Rhode Island included in the Brayton Point appeal.
The state challenges Brayton Point’s argument that Rhode Island state water quality standards have no place in the setting of permit limits and addresses Brayton Point’s attempt to supplement the administrative record with documents generated after the time for public comment was closed.
The Petition to Intervene also challenges Brayton Point’s contention that EPA’s permit, in calling for huge reductions to Brayton Point’s water usage and thermal discharge, should have taken into greater account the cost of installing necessary technology.
Brayton Point’s arguments in its appeal, according to Lynch, would not only result in less stringent permit limits but would result in ongoing damage to Rhode Island’s environment.
DEM’s acting director, Frederick Vincent, said, "It is certainly disappointing that after so much time and effort was spent developing a tough, but fair permit for the Brayton Point power station, the company is opting to oppose rather than abide by the permit. We join with the Attorney General’s Office in calling upon the board to reject Brayton Point’s appeal and uphold the permit, thus requiring the company to take the steps necessary to meet environmental standards."
Originally constructed in the 1960s, Brayton Point is the largest fossil fuel burning electricity-generating power plant in New England, burning approximately 10,000 tons of coal each day, according to Michael J. Healey of the Attorney General’s Office.
Brayton Point is only about 38 percent efficient, meaning that roughly 62 percent of the energy from the burning fuel is discharged into the environment, mainly as wasted heat, Healey said. Brayton Point relies on Mount Hope Bay both as a source for the billions of gallons of water it needs to cool its generators and as a dumping ground for the trillions of BTUs of waste heat it discharges, according to Healey. Roughly two-thirds of Mount Hope Bay lies within Rhode Island.
Three of Brayton Point’s four generating units have historically used open-cycle cooling systems that use bay water to cool the generators, with the heated water then discharged straight back into Mount Hope Bay. The fourth and largest unit, built in the 1970s, employed closed-cycle cooling system that discharged its waste heat to the atmosphere. In 1984, Brayton Point converted this unit to open-cycle cooling as well, with the conversion increasing the facility’s water usage by more than 35 percent—from 730 million to nearly one billion gallons of Mount Hope Bay water per day, Healey said.
Beginning in 1993, studies by DEM fisheries began to connect Brayton Point’s increased water usage with a dramatic decrease in the number and diversity of fish in Mount Hope Bay, a biologically significant nursery area of many species of fish found throughout Narragansett Bay and Rhode Island Sound, Healey said.
The increase in water usage at Brayton Point is now believed by many to have greatly accelerated a steady decline in the Mount Hope Bay fishery that is believed to be the result of historic operations at Brayton Point, as well as overfishing. Despite severe fishing restrictions imposed by the DEM in recent years, many important Mount Hope Bay species, such as winter flounder, continue to remain at all-time low populations, as they have since 1985, Healey said.
Under provisions of the Clean Water Act, the federal government has to notify a neighboring state if the actions to be permitted will impact the state’s clean water standards. The EPA must ensure that its permit limits satisfy Rhode Island’s water quality standards.
In issuing its final permit, the EPA called for Brayton Point to restrict its water usage and thermal discharge to levels that will all but require the power station to implement closed-cycle cooling, a more environmentally protective cooling method.
Using closed-cycle cooling, Brayton Point would recycle most of its cooling waters, taking in comparatively small quantities to make up for losses to evaporation. The implementation of the closed-cycle method would entail the installation of new technology.
The process of arriving at the final permit involved nine years of study, public comment, testimony and the generation of massive amounts of documents.
Under the Environmental Appeals Board Rules of Practice, the EPA must reply within 45 days of an appeal. With Brayton Point filing its appeal Nov. 5, the EPA has until Dec. 29 to reply. Petitions to Intervene or Amici briefs must be filed by Dec. 29, as well. Brayton Point is also arguing that due to the EPA’s proposed new regulations for cooling water intake structures for existing facilities, the Environmental Appeals Board cannot rule until those regulations are finalized.
"Our goal in filing the Petition to Intervene," Lynch said, "is to take a formal seat in the legal process involving Brayton Point, to drive home our point that we are taking as strong a stand as possible, on behalf of the environment of Mount Hope Bay."
|
To
send us your comments, questions, and suggestions click
here |