With such a concentration of heavy industry, Northwest Indiana depends on an array of dirty power plants to generate the needed electricity.

via [ Post-Trib ] NIPSCO plant makes dubious national list - Four area plants named in report on CO2 emissions By Gitte Laasby

Northern Indiana Public Service Co.’s R.M. Schahfer Generating Station in Wheatfield is the 43rd-dirtiest power plant in the nation in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, according to a report released Tuesday.

The report also states that Indiana power plants emitted the fourth-most carbon dioxide pollution in the nation in 2007.

Four of Northwest Indiana’s power plants are mentioned in the report by Environment America, “America’s Biggest Polluters: Carbon dioxide emissions from power plants in 2007″: The R.M. Schahfer Generating Station, Michigan City Generating Station, Bailly Generating Station and Whiting Clean Energy. Combined, they emitted more than 18.9 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2007. That’s the equivalent of more than 3.3 million cars.

Power plants are the single-largest source of the country’s carbon dioxide emissions, according to the report. The emission numbers come from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s acid rain program, which requires power plants to report certain emissions.

“America’s fleet of coal-fired power plants emitted more than 80 percent of CO2 pollution from U.S. power plants in 2007 and 36 percent of the total U.S. CO2 pollution, as well as disproportionate amounts of smog- and soot-forming pollutants, toxic mercury, and other toxic air pollutants,” the report says.

Gabriel Filippelli, chairman of the Department of Earth Sciences at Indiana University-Purdue University-Purdue at Indianapolis, said cutting emissions is key to avoiding the most dangerous effects of global warming, but would also reduce soot pollution, which can lead to asthma, and mercury pollution, which can damage the nervous system.

About half of the country’s electricity comes from coal, which has the highest carbon content of any fossil fuel per unit of energy, according to the report.

“We should be moving to clean, renewable energy like wind and solar. At least, old and new plants should be required to meet the same modern standards for global warming pollution. No plants currently have to meet standards for global warming pollution, making them unchecked contributors to global warming,” said Megan Severson, Midwest field organizer for Environment America.

The EPA has proposed requiring new and significantly modified power plants and industries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. Within a few months, the U.S. Senate is expected to consider a cap-and-trade proposal to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Older plants pollute proportionally more than new plants. Plants built before 1980 produced 73 percent of America’s carbon emissions although they represent less than half of the plants, the report said. For each year older a coal generator is on average, it creates an additional kilo of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour of electricity it produced.

Severson said older plants emit more carbon dioxide because newer plants burn natural gas while older ones mainly burn coal. She said efficiency may be another reason newer plants emit less than older ones, but couldn’t elaborate.

NIPSCO plant makes dubious national list :: Local News :: Post-Tribune.

[ Report ] By the Environment America Research and Policy Center

Thomas Energy, Environment