SierraScape February - March 2005
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by Jill Miller

Missouri's municipal utilities may risk buying electricity from a dirty coal-fired power plant in Illinois that threatens a National Wildlife Refuge in Missouri, ignoring cleaner and safer options.

Peabody Corp., headquartered in St. Louis, wants to build a large (1,500 Megawatt) coal-burning power plant in Washington County, IL about 55 miles southeast of St. Louis. The facility would spew thousands of tons of smog-forming pollutants, as well as soot, mercury, and carbon dioxide, into our skies.

This plant will also emit as much global warming pollution as our old coal plants, and over 100 times more pollution than a cleaner-burning natural gas plant.

Coal is an inherently dirty fuel that is causing health problems for Missourians. The U.S. EPA has designated St. Louis as failing to federal air quality standards for soot and smog pollution. Soot and smog cause asthma attacks, lung cancer, and even premature death. U.S. EPA consultants estimate that coal pollution already causes 754 premature deaths and 16,634 asthma attacks every year in Missouri.

The U.S. Department of Interior's Fish and Wildlife Service has studied this project and found that Peabody's proposed emissions would have an "adverse impact" on Mingo National Wildlife Refuge in the Missouri boot-heel. According to their studies, the facility would deposit acid-forming pollution and reduce visibility. Only three such determinations on power plants have been made in the last twenty years. At this writing, Peabody is refusing to agree to reduce its pollution by using modern pollution control in order to protect public health and Mingo.

St. Louis-area businesses are also threatened by Peabody's pollution. Existing St. Louis businesses are on the hook to install costly pollution controls and reduce overall pollution to safe levels. Peabody's proposed coal plant is located less than two miles outside of the Greater St. Louis region.

With its 500-foot smoke stacks Peabody's pollution will blow across the St. Louis region and require existing businesses to cut their pollution even more.

There are cleaner, safer alternatives. Other states are cutting energy needs through energy efficiency. Other Missouri communities are meeting their future energy needs with renewable energy, such as wind farms. Clean-burning natural gas emit no mercury, no soot, and one-half of the global warming pollution of coal.

If coal were the only option (which it is not) then at a minimum it is time to abandon out-dated combustion technologies as proposed by Peabody in favor of "coal-gasification" technology, also know as Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC). IGCC technology can remove significantly more pollution than traditional coal plants, and creates 25 percent less global warming pollution than Peabody's proposal.

Right now, Peabody is looking to Missouri for utility customers to buy electricity. Some municipal utilities that belong to the Missouri Public Utilities Alliance have tentatively agreed to purchase 100 MW from Prairie State. Others, like Columbia Power and Light in Columbia, MO, have been approached. The City of Batavia, IL, recently decided to hold off purchasing electricity from Prairie State after learning that cleaner, less risky options may be available.

PEABODY'S PROJECT IS BAD FOR MISSOURI. Missouri municipal utilities should look for cleaner, more cost-effective, responsible sources of power than Peabody's risky Prairie State generating plant.