August 17, 2009

IL Home to "Clunkers" of the Power Plant World

There's a great piece in today's Washington Post about how "the clunkers of the power plant world" (great quote by clean air champ Brian Urbaszewski of the Respiratory Health Association of Metropolitan Chicago!)may or may not be impacted by energy legislation before the Congress this year.

The Post story focuses on the two "clunkers" in Chicago - the Crawford and Fisk coal plants that we are currently targeting with legal actions, but they are not the only plants in Illinois. Illinois has 16 of these old plants that don't have to burn as cleanly as a modern plant.

The real fix here would be to level the playing field, and establish clean national standards for emissions that apply to all coal plants, and end the double standard that keeps these clunkers roaring throughout the state, and the country. That would correct an error in the Clean Air Act that created the double standard we are living with today, and expedite a transition to cleaner energy, create new jobs, and clear the air.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks to Jack and ALL the members for their steadfast support over the years in fighting to protect people's right to breathe clean air!

Brian Urbaszewski
Respiratory Health Assn - Metro Chicago

Alan Milton said...

Alan Milton
Recently I visited a old coal fired power station in Belgium Europe. the employees were proud of their station as it was a "Green Energy minimum polution power station"
How was this achieved
By converting it from coal to wood pellets
The intreresting thing is that the wood pellets came from North America
Our own back yard.So our wood pellets are making european power stations Green and healthy but here in Illinois we are complaining about or old coal fired stations
Maybe the US pellet industry can help us generate cleaner electricity by converting old coal fired stations to wood pellets right here in Illinois
If you want more information contact me at l.alan.milton@gmail.com