January 18, 2008
Piles of ugly waste-coal dot Pennsylvania's landscape. But now an international power plant designer will take that abandoned mine cast-off and use it to create steam and additional electricity. Sithe Global, which is applying for permits to build such a 300-megawatt power plant, says that there is enough waste-coal to last well into the future.
Waste-coal, which is poor quality coal that is mixed in with dirt and which has sat idle for decades, poses a serious threat to the landscape and to local water quality. By reusing it, power companies not only mitigate those hazards but they also harness what would otherwise be a continuing menace.
Sithe says that its proposed power operations would cost about $900 million and require dozens of permits, all before it would go online in 2013. The plant, to be located in Johnstown, Pa., would take in 1.5 million pounds of waste-coal each year and use circulating fluidized bed boilers that the company says cuts harmful emissions by 90 percent when compared to standard boilers. That newer technology, in essence, creates a limestone byproduct and alkaline ash that is used to contain abandoned mine drainage and minimize the acidic qualities of waste-coal storm water run-off.
State regulators say that the technology is the best way to reduce reclamation costs and to clean up areas that have been devastated by such waste. It's not the first-of-its-kind project. A few more are currently operating in Pennsylvania, some of which became operational in the early 1990s. As far as Sithe goes, it says that it is filing additional applications to build similar plants, which should indicate its optimism with regard to these kinds of projects. One likely reason is that waste coal qualifies as a renewable resource under Pennsylvania's Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard, the only state to do so.
Something must be done. The U.S. Office of Surface Mining will pay $28 million this year so that Pennsylvania can start reclaiming land that has been spoiled by abandoned mine sites and waste-coal. Altogether, it will receive $1.36 billion over the next 18 years to repair about 184,000 acres of land -- all necessary to help a state that is more afflicted than any other, with 44 of its 67 counties having abandoned mine issues.
To be clear, a profound difference exists between "waste-coal" and "coal waste." The former is simply poor quality coal that has been pushed aside and allowed to leach into watersheds and soil. The latter is a "coal combustion byproduct" that includes fly ash and bottom ash. Routine coal plant operations are estimated to produce annually about 28 million tons of such byproducts, which have traditionally been placed in landfills but now have the potential of being used for things like construction products and cement.
"The advantages of these 'waste-coal' projects is taking material that is having a significant impact on the environment and removing it," says Nathan Plagens, vice president of Desert Rock Energy in Northern New Mexico, which is a subsidiary of Sithe Global. "They are then replacing that harmful material with a product that mitigates the impact on the environment."
Sigh of Relief
A waste-coal plant is sprouting up in Greenbrier County, West Virginia that is part of President Bush's Clean Coal Power Initiative. The joint venture between the U.S. Department of Energy and Western Greenbrier Co-Generation -- each of which will share equally the total $215 million price tag -- will use nearby waste-coal to generate electricity to heat and support local industrial operations.
The Greenbrier project, which will take five years to be completed and which will become operational in 2011, is expected to consume nearly 400 million tons of coal refuse that is located in several hundred sites in the state. The muck is estimated to carry a cleanup cost of $2 billion to $3 billion, which State Department of Environmental Protection officials characterize as West Virginia's premier environmental hazard.
Meanwhile, one of the biggest waste-coal plants in the nation is now under construction in Greene County, Pennsylvania. While environmental groups are still trying to stop it, the plant will burn 85 percent coal refuse and 15 percent newly mined coal.
Pennsylvania regulators said that Fairmont, West Virginia-based Wellington Development's $1.3 billion project will not adversely affect state and federal air standards. Critics of it, however, say that the developer is not using the best-available pollution control technologies. The 525-megawatt plant, they add, will burn 3.1 million tons of waste-coal each year and impede visibility in Shenandoah National Park that is 100 miles away as well as in Dolly Sods National Wilderness that is 60 miles away in West Virginia.
"In a region of the country already heavily impacted by air pollutants from coal-fired power plants, Pennsylvania is not requiring this plant to minimize its pollution to the greatest extent possible," says Michael Parker, policy and outreach coordinator with the Group Against Smog and Pollution, in a story that ran in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "We can and should do better."
But both the courts and regulators there disagree. In issuing its decision to uphold a Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection ruling that the plant be allowed to go forth, the state's Environmental Hearing Board issued a 118-page opinion that said the plant will use state-of-the-art equipment. As such, they added that it will better protect air quality than other, prevailing coal technologies around today. That decision was appealed in Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court, which upheld it. Now, the case is being raised before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court that has not said if it will hear it.
Making use of waste-coal can be a win-win proposition. It not only eliminates an ecological blight but it also turns an environmental liability into a usable fuel. By removing waste-coal and then utilizing it for electric generation, areas long plagued by highly acidic and polluted run-off to nearby streams can breathe a sigh of relief.
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