More Dirty Air for Newark with DEP Permit

More Dirty Air for Newark with DEP Permit
Date : Tue, 1 Nov 2016 17:39:27 -0400

More Dirty Air for Newark with DEP Permit

The Department of Environmental Protection will have a public hearing tonight on their draft air pollution control permit that will increase pollution from the Newark Energy Center. The Newark Energy Center is a natural gas power plant that is one of many air pollution sources in an already overburdened environmental justice area. This permit will increase the carbon footprint of the facility by allowing it to emit 156,624 more pounds of carbon dioxide, while removing the cap on pollution. As a result, the people of Newark will see more climate change impacts, flooding, and air pollution problems. The hearing will be held tonight at the Mary Burch Theater at Essex County College, located at 303 University Avenue, Newark, NJ 07102 from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM.

“We need to be cleaning up Newark’s air, but instead this permit is going to make it dirtier and more unhealthy. This permit allows the Newark Energy Center to increase both air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, which will hit the people living in Newark right in their lungs. We are opposed to this permit because it will further climate change impacts for Newark’s Ironbound neighborhood and surrounding communities. This area is an environmental justice community that has been overburdened by air pollution, while threatened with flooding and sea level rise from Hurricane Sandy. By issuing this new permit, DEP will only make those impacts worse by increasing emissions compared to current operations,” said Jeff Tittel, Director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. “This permit is clearly part of the Christie Administration rolling back protections and put more people and property at risk.”

We are very concerned with these changes because they are not based on science or health standards. If the emissions exceed that rate, they can keep burning because they have deregulated, removed the cap on pollution, and eliminating compliance mechanisms. This includes: 1)Remove FC REF#16 as NEC has provided all funds to the city of Newark and no longer has any control or knowledge of those funds. 2)Remove (2) Ammonia Storage Tanks (IS2) 3) Change the compliance monitoring calculation for annual VOC, TSP, PM-10 and PM2.5 emission limits to be based on actual emission rates from the latest stack test performed, rather than on the maximum emission rate permitted. 4) Change the compliance monitoring calculation for annual SO2 emission limits to be based on emission rates calculated from the latest monthly natural gas sulfur test, rather than on the maximum emission rate permitted. Remove New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) conditions which require the installation and operation of a continuous opacity monitoring system for NOX and SOX.

“What the DEP is doing is actually removing all the caps and limits on pollution so NEC can pollute as much as they want instead of protecting public health. That means Newark will see more carbon dioxide and toxic chemicals hitting us directly in our lungs. Newark’s school children alone experience a 25 percent asthma rate, double the state and national rates. These air toxins also cause respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. They are actually suffering from more air toxins that are a hundred times greater than air toxin standards,” said Jeff Tittel. “The sulfuric acid that is being emitted is not only dangerous to human health but will be released from the chemical drift coming from the cooling towers. The chemical drift can also contain heavy metals like lead, algaecides and fungicides, and volatile organic compounds. This will have significant impacts on environment around this facility and could lead to a calamity. The companies that make cooling towers warn that the chemical drift could kill plant life near cooling towers.”

Pollution from natural gas power plants can be worse than coal power plants when you look at the life-cycle analysis from cradle to grave. Methane emissions, is 87 more potent than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. Natural gas has 30 percent less carbon than coal when burned in the power plant, but has more methane released. If you look at leakage of methane from pipelines and drilling, natural gas has about the same emissions as coal, overall.

“The DEP says that they are increasing carbon emissions because the EPA changed the global warming potential for methane and nitrous oxide. If this is the case, they should make the plant reduce emissions and not allow an increase that will further impact climate change. With all the methane emissions and leaks from the pipeline, fracking and the plant, this facility is just as bad as a coal plant,” said Jeff Tittel. “Our Governor has prevented us from meeting future pollution reduction goals, closed the Office of Climate Change and removing us from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. The administration significantly subsidized gas fire power plants, while rolling back goals for solar and wind. This is all part of our Governor’s anti-environmental agenda to take care of polluters.”

We are additionally concerned that under the DEP permit process for a Title 5 Air Permit is supposed to incorporate the entire CO2 emissions, including from the pipeline and smokestacks, but this permit does not take that into account. This permit will continue to significantly increase toxic air pollution for Ironbound, an Environmental Justice community who are already classified as a nonattainment area under the Clean Air Act. Newark communities, including Ironbound have been overburdened with air pollution, which is 1000 times health based standards increasing risk assessments for cancer.

“Newark is already overburdened with air pollution from the airport, ports, three power plants, emissions from trucks and traffic on the Turnpike and Route 280, as well as numerous toxic and industrial sites. This power plant should have never been built in the first place, but now this permit will increase Newark’s air problems,” said Jeff Tittel, Director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. “We need the DEP to reject this permit application and make the Newark Energy Center reduce emissions to clean up Newark’s air. This plant impacts the health of the people in the community, especially those with asthma and respiratory diseases. The DEP has become the Department of Excessive Pollution, but now they need to do their job to protect the environment and the public.”

This public notice, the statement of basis, and the draft permit have been posted at the Department’s website: http://www.state.nj.us/dep/aqpp/publicnotices.htm and can be found attached.



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Toni Granato Administrative Assistant New Jersey Sierra Club office:(609) 656-7612 https://www.facebook.com/NJSierraClub @NJSierraClub and @StopPilgrimNYNJ on Twitter
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Received on 2016-11-01 14:39:27