Posted on 08/17/2004 3:31:56 PM PDT by take
N.Y. Orders Power Plants to Cut Emissions New York Issues Emergency Order to Cut Acid Rain Emissions, Citing Public Health Emergency
ALBANY, N.Y. Aug. 17, 2004 — Citing what they called a public health emergency, New York officials on Tuesday ordered power plants to reduce emissions blamed for acid rain. State Environmental Conservation Commissioner Erin Crotty announced the emergency order aimed at reducing admissions at least temporarily. At the same time, she announced an appeal of the decision by a state judge this spring that had blocked the same regulations from taking effect permanently.
"These regulations are critical in order to further protect public health and New York's precious natural resources," Crotty said.
"Any delay in implementing these critical regulations will result in more than 40,000 tons of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide being pumped into New York's air," she added.
Power plants and unions had sued the state over its anti-pollution regulations. In the ruling in May, Supreme Court Judge Leslie Stein upheld the state's right to establish the strict measures, but found the state had missed its own deadline to adopt them.
Because the new order cites a health emergency, it isn't directly reviewed by the court, but power plants could still sue to reverse it. The emergency order would reduce pollution levels for at least 90 days but could be extended to 1 1/2 years or more.
Crotty said the state has requested an expedited ruling on the appeal that struck down the permanent regulations. The executive order from Gov. George Pataki had called for reductions of nitrogen oxide by 70 percent and of sulfur by 50 percent by 2008.
A spokeswoman for NRG Energy declined to comment.
About 76,200 tons of nitrogen oxide and 232,000 tons of sulfur dioxide are emitted annually, according to a 2002 state study.
Green Wealth: Funding the Enemy (TRACKING THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT'S MONEY, POWER, AND HARM)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1192080/posts
Don't for get the increase in cost. "Working poor" hit hardest.
NO you will pay of it
A public health emergency caused by acid rain with precursor chemicals emitted by power plants in New York? That's got to be absolutely awful. Why haven't I heard about it? Let me thank [BLEEP] that I'm not in New York.
Acid rain has nothing to do with carbon, and has been an acknowledged problem for the northeast for decades.
Wasn't it TEXAS that sold electrical energy at,"inflated prices", to Calif. when they couldn't produce enough to meet demands?
Please GOD let me inherit a power plant in neighboring Pa.
You wanna see gougeinf?
Where Does Acid Rain Affect Lakes and Streams?
Many lakes and streams examined in a National Surface Water Survey (NSWS) suffer from chronic acidity, a condition in which water has a constant low pH level. The survey investigated the effects of acidic deposition in over 1,000 lakes larger than 10 acres and in thousands of miles of streams believed to be sensitive to acidification. Of the lakes and streams surveyed, acid rain caused acidity in 75 percent of the acidic lakes and about 50 percent of the acidic streams. Several regions in the U.S. were identified as containing many of the surface waters sensitive to acidification. They include the Adirondacks and Catskill Mountains in New York state, the mid-Appalachian highlands along the east coast, the upper Midwest, and mountainous areas of the Western United States. In areas like the Northeastern United States, where soil buffering capacity is poor, some lakes now have a pH value of less than 5. One of the most acidic lakes reported is Little Echo Pond in Franklin, New York. Little Echo Pond has a pH of 4.2.
Acidification is also a problem in lakes that were not surveyed in federal research projects. For example, although lakes smaller than 10 acres were not included in the NSWS, there are from one to four times as many of these small lakes as there are larger lakes. In the Adirondacks, the percentage of acidic lakes is significantly higher when it includes smaller lakes.
Streams flowing over soil with low buffering capacity are as susceptible to damage from acid rain as lakes. Approximately 580 of the streams in the Mid-Atlantic Coastal Plain are acidic primarily due to acidic deposition. In the New Jersey Pine Barrens, for example, over 90 percent of the streams are acidic, which is the highest rate of acidic streams in the nation. Over 1,350 of the streams in the Mid-Atlantic Highlands (mid-Appalachia) are acidic, primarily due to acidic deposition.
The acidification problem in both the United States and Canada grows in magnitude if "episodic acidification" is taken into account. Episodic acidification refers to brief periods during which pH levels decrease due to runoff from melting snow or heavy downpours. Lakes and streams in many areas throughout the United States are sensitive to episodic acidification. In the Mid-Appalachians, the Mid-Atlantic Coastal Plain, and the Adirondack Mountains, many additional lakes and streams become temporarily acidic during storms and spring snowmelt. For example, approximately 70 percent of sensitive lakes in the Adirondacks are at risk of episodic acidification. This amount is over three times the amount of chronically acidic lakes. In the mid-Appalachians, approximately 30 percent of sensitive streams are likely to become acidic during an episode. This level is seven times the number of chronically acidic streams in that area. Episodic acidification can cause "fish kills."
Emissions from U.S. sources also contribute to acidic deposition in eastern Canada, where the soil is very similar to the soil of the Adirondack Mountains, and the lakes are consequently extremely vulnerable to chronic acidification problems. The Canadian government has estimated that 14,000 lakes in eastern Canada are acidic.
greenhouse gas emissions and to socio-economic data and tools http://unfccc.int/program/mis/ghg/sources.html
That's Enron party-line bullsheet. Peak demand in CA was *lower* during the power "crisis" than the year before. We just experienced our highest-ever peak demand, and there were no blackouts... and it wasn't because our retail rates were deregulated or because we added a bunch of new generation, because neither are true. Suppliers gamed the California market through spot market manipulation, and that's a fact. Conservatives just look like arses when we pretend the obvious and documented couldn't actually have happened, because it conflicts with our pet theories.
Sounds like the New York economy is in for some dark times. Talk about a cost of living increase.
"The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of "liberalism" they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened." Norman Thomas, for many years U.S. Socialist Presidential candidate. http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~davidj2/com.html
If I were a plant operator, I would cut back energy production to meet the reduced total emmisions figure, and have "dark" hours every day.
I would start immediately.
Nothing sadder than the willfully ignorant.
Just making fun of what had been reported about the "Calif. crisis".
And understanding that if N.Y. starts getting Kyoto on its power plants and population at this point it is going to cost N.Y. residents out the nose.
So what do you know about NW hydro conditions year to year?
Power plant maintence?
The fact is lots of things contributed to the energy 'crises'. Dry hydro conditions, turnover in ownership of PG&Es generation (and the resultant loss of knowledge of how to keep the old beasts running).
Finally the market was built broken. Enron for example was able to extract large amounts of cash legally though arbitrage. The fact that one of their traders refered to it as stealing on tape does'nt make it illegal (look up arbitrage if this is unclear to you). If CA sold beers for a buck but was paying $10 for a sixpack they won't be able to tell me the millions I made are wrong. They were just stupid.
Also the fact is that they have added generation. Quite a bit. The often quoted statistic is the number of new plants year to year which is HIGHLY crooked. In the 90s new plants in CA were small cogen projects, the new ones are big.
Texas does not sell power across state lines and therefor is not regulated by the Federal Government.
Make that "nearly all" of Texas. 85% of the electrical power need is served by ERCOT. Some of the border area are served by companies that are mainly in other states.
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