Environmental Groups Put Plant Bidders On Notice

Northwest environmental groups have issued an open letter to potential bidders for the Centralia power plant warning they will oppose continued use of coal fuel at the site.

The letter, released Thursday, calls the 1,340-megawatt facility the largest single polluter in the region.

Emissions each year include 9 million tons of carbon dioxide, 64,000 tons of sulfur dioxide and 16,000 tons of nitrogen oxide.

The fumes have been blamed for haze that occasionally obscures Mt. Rainier.

And the facility’s mercury emissions, undisclosed so far, will create additional problems when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency imposes reporting requirements later this year, the letter says.

In 1997, the Washington Legislature gave the owners of the plant and adjacent mine a 30-year tax break on $260 million in emissions scrubbing equipment that would bring the plant into compliance with increasingly tight environmental standards.

But that group, including Avista Corp., decided last year to sell the plant instead of installing scrubbers.

PacifiCorp spokesman David Kvamme said a buyer could be named by the middle of next month. The Portland-based utility operates Centralia and owns the largest share.

The letter, signed by representatives of 22 groups, says would-be purchasers should be wary.

“If bidders are trying to buy the plant with the intention of continuing to burn coal there, they are wasting their money,” it says, adding:.

“Count on us to seek the strictest scrutiny by state utility regulators of any proposed sale that contemplates business as usual at the plant.”

Ralph Cavanaugh, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said Friday the signers of the letter do not think the technology exists that will enable the Centralia plant to remain in compliance with emissions standards.

He said natural gas-fired turbines should replace the coal installation, which dates to the 1970s. Even if the plant and mine are closed, the West Side site and its connections to the Northwest transmission grid would be valuable assets to any buyer, he said.

“You’ve got to have a plant at that site for reliability reasons,” Cavanaugh said.

Although he stopped short of saying the groups would sue if a buyer continued to burn coal at the plant, he said they intend to see all environmental laws enforced.

Kvamme said the scrubbers will not only enable Centralia to meet emissions criteria, they will also preserve more than 600 jobs in an economically depressed area. Most of those jobs are in the mine, which would be closed if the generating plant switched to gas.

“We have a very elegant environmental solution,” he said, adding that the scrubbers would place Centralia among the nation’s cleanest coal plants.

Avista spokesman Rob Strenge said the letter was a surprise to the owners. Negotiations that led to the agreement to install scrubbers included the EPA, Park Service and state authorities, he said.

Strenge added that the owners had looked at the feasibility of converting the site to natural gas. “The economics are prohibitive,” he said.