Posted June 3, 2010
By Emily A. Peters
Abilene Reporter-News
Nothing currently limits the amount of carbon dioxide a factory can puff into the atmosphere, a consultant with the Tenaska power company said at a hearing Thursday.
But federal regulations limiting such greenhouse gases go into effect soon — Jan. 2, 2011, to be exact.
Tenaska officials expect to have an air quality permit in hand for a $3.5 billion plant near Sweetwater before those regulations kick in, but they still asked environmental consultant William Campbell to suggest a CO2 limit for the Sweetwater project, called Trailblazer.
Campbell brought his emission limit suggestions to Thursday’s hearing, where environmental groups are opposing the air quality permit Tenaska seeks from the Texas Environmental Quality Control to build Trailblazer.
"I don’t agree a plant should have a CO2 limit because it’s not required," Cambell said, but at Tenaska’s request, he calculated Trailblazer should emit no more than 8.02 million tons a year of carbon dioxide equivalent from its boilers.
No authority will keep Trailblazer from exceeding that level.
He noted that is just "speculation" considering Trailblazer has little precedence to follow. Tenaska boasts Trailblazer’s revolutionary technology will capture 85 to 90 percent of that CO2, and Tenaska will sell it to Permian Basin oil companies for drilling purposes.
Attorneys for opposition groups — the Sierra Club and the Multi-County Coalition — pointed out that emission figure does not include emissions from other parts of the plant beyond the boilers. They also noted other factories are voluntarily offering to comply with CO2 limits.
Tenaska also called a toxicology expert to testify, and Multi-County Coalition attorney Wendi Hammond asked about potential harmful effects of emissions from amine chemical compounds proposed for the plant.
The toxicologist said early calculations didn’t reveal high enough levels of potentially harmful emissions to require Tenaska to mention them in the permit application. Studies of downwind effects of the chemical are not required for the TCEQ permit, another expert testified.
Tenaska has no more witnesses for the hearing and TCEQ witnesses will testify next, including some who helped Tenaska prepare its air quality permit application.
On Monday, opposition groups will present their witnesses, who are expected to discuss global warming and an alternative system for breaking down coal.
Four Big Country landowners attended the meetings and more are expected to rotate through as the hearings continue through next week. They won’t personally testify, but they are represented by the Multi-County Coalition attorney.
As the trial proceeds in Austin, other controversy is stirring around Texas air quality control:
Last week, the EPA stripped TCEQ of the authority to issue an operating permit for a Corpus Christi refinery. EPA warned federal regulators could overtake TCEQ’s air-permitting process for other facilities as well.
Gov. Rick Perry accused the EPA of "seek[ing] to destroy Texas’s successful clean air program and threaten tens of thousands of good Texas jobs in the process."
Wednesday, the Sierra Club and Earthjustice sent notice of intent to sue the EPA unless it enforced ozone standards in Texas more strictly.
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