I did a quick piece for the Gazette’s Sustained Outrage blog about EPA’s very quick turnaround this year in releasing federal Toxics Release Inventory data.
While I haven’t had a ton of time to analyze the new numbers, I did notice what appears to be a pretty large cut in statewide total air emissions of TRI toxic chemicals … something around 40 percent, if the preliminary EPA data turns out to be correct.
And, a big chunk of that appears to be coming from pollution reductions at some of the state’s largest coal-fired power plants — like the John Amos plant out near St. Albans, where total air emissions reported to the TRI program dropped by half between 2008 and 2009.
Other coal plants, all typically among the state’s biggest polluters, also showed big drops. They included some of the big facilities owned by American Electric Power and Allegheny Energy.
The reason? A combination of things is likely, power company officials say, including the economic downturn — which cuts demand for power — as well as new pollution control equipment on some of the plants and, probably, even a switch by some electricity buyers to natural gas.
Subscribe to the Coal Tattoo
I’ll be the first to thank the power companies for their reduction of emissions and the epa for their timely release of the data.
I for one have noticed that the ever-present giant orange band in the western sky over Charleston emanating from the John Amos power plant has been gone ever since they brought online the polution controls.
Huge difference from the first day.