In November 2024, Sierra Club reached a settlement with Ameren Missouri, the state’s largest electric utility, requiring Ameren to pay up to $61 million to compensate the public for the illegal pollution emitted for over ten years from the now-shuttered Rush Island coal plant that it owns near St. Louis, Missouri.
The settlement is split between two funding streams: the “HEPA Purifier Program” with a $25 million budget, and the “Electric Buses & Charging Infrastructure Program” with a $36 million budget. The HEPA program will offer a $200 voucher for up to 125,000 residential customers to acquire a High Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) purifier device from a qualified vendor. Following a pilot period to work out any implementation issues, distribution will prioritize census tracts with the lowest median income and move the income scale up until at least 125,000 offers have been tendered. The electric buses program aims to put 80 zero-emissions, all-electric school buses into service along with one charging station, with no fewer than two charging ports, per electric bus.
Should money remain in either program after implementation is complete, the balance will transfer into a “Weatherization and Energy Efficiency Project” fund. This fund will support investments in residential buildings in Ameren’s service area that prioritize low-income and disadvantaged communities. Examples of projects include floor, wall, and attic insulation, sealing of windows and doors, duct sealing, and passive solar retrofits.
Ameren’s history of minimizing its harm through public relations and greenwashing activities does not reduce the real harm that occurred due to Rush Island’s 10+ years of illegal operations. Ameren went as far as telling the Missouri Public Service Commission, after losing twice in federal court, that “no rational utility would have done anything differently with respect to Rush Island.” Utility greenwashing is one of the reasons why the Sierra Club releases its Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges report annually, for which Ameren scored 13 out of 100 points in the latest assessment released in October 2024.
The settlement, reached between Ameren, the United States Department of Justice, and the Sierra Club, resolves long-standing federal court litigation alleging that Ameren made major modifications to its Rush Island coal plant without getting a permit and without installing the requisite pollution controls. Sierra Club was represented in this case by Sierra Club Senior Attorney Sunil Bector and outside counsel Ben Blustein from Miner, Barnhill, and Galland.