Pee Dee Coal Plant (SC )

Santee Cooper must explore alternatives to dirty coal

Unlike a private utility, state-owned Santee Cooper proposes plants without ANY needs review by the public utilities commission.

Santee Cooper has gotten its projections wrong in the past; it looks to have gotten them wrong again. In fact, if Santee Cooper just did at least as much as investor-owned utilities (Duke, Progress), investments in local efficiency alone could avoid the need for this plant. Why won’t Santee Cooper look at that option, which could create more jobs and save millions for homeowners, businesses and electrical co-ops?

The Environmental Impact Statment Must Look at Alternatives to Reduce Pollution and Create More Jobs

The EIS must look at all alternatives, including no coal plant.
If Santee Cooper increased efficiency by 1% a year, it could avoid building this plant altogether. States with high growth, like Florida and North Carolina, are engaging aggressive energy efficiency and renewable standards to meet energy needs cheaply and cleanly, and are rejecting new coal.
In the Carolinas, Duke and Progress have launched initiatives to generate thousands of megawatts (more than this plant would produce) from greater efficiency and renewables. Santee Cooper, meanwhile, wants to build more coal units like it built in Cross, S.C. (without required permits).
South Carolina uses more electricity per person than 46 other states. Compared to California it uses double the energy per unit of economic output. The room for improvement in our state is low hanging fruit that needs to be picked first before embarking on a costly polluting coal plant.
Efficiency is not only the cheapest, fastest, cleanest and safest way to generate power; efficiency and renewables can produce more local jobs than a highly automated plant burning dirty imported fuel.
Even the plant’s billion-dollar price tag is an obvious low-ball. An Edison Electric Institute report issued in September 2007 shows that costs for this kind of plant have greatly escalated (25% - 35%).

Dirty Coal Is Not “Clean”

Air Pollution

Santee Cooper’s own numbers show this plant will generate 3,500 tons of ozone-forming NOx, 7,500 tons of soot-forming SO2, and 900 tons of lung-damaging particulate matter every year. What are the health effects on children and the elderly?
This is the Ford Pinto of power plants. A higher-tech plant would produce 1/10th as much SO2 and 1/3 as much NOx and particulate matter. Why is Santee Cooper building an old-model unit when other utilities are building higher-tech plants?
Investments in local efficiency and renewables produce virtually no air pollution and create jobs. Cleaner, cheaper . . . smarter.

Mercury

This plant would spew nearly 400 pounds of mercury each year, right next to the Great Pee Dee River. Mercury is a powerful neurotoxin that makes its way into the developing brains of children and unborn babies when they or their mothers eat contaminated fish, and puts children at risk for learning disabilities and lowers IQs.
The Waccamaw, Pee Dee, and Lynches Rivers are under health advisories because of mercury in fish – as is the entire coast of South Carolina. Over half the mercury emitted nationwide comes from coal fired power plants.
Santee Cooper is not doing everything it could to control mercury from this low-tech pulverized coal plant. Activated carbon injection would reduce mercury emissions by a factor of ten. Instead of using those controls, Santee Cooper would spread mercury pollution and costs to the community.
Efficiency gains and renewables produce no mercury. Even higher-tech coal plants would produce much less mercury.

Ash Ponds

The solid metals, dust and ash that make up the waste of this plant will be dumped into “ash ponds” that take up hundreds of acres, impact wetlands, and threaten nearby ground and surface waters.
A recent EPA report found that coal ash waste ponds without liners pose cancer risks because they migrate into water. Why is Santee Cooper proposing unlined ash ponds near the Great Pee Dee River, a major freshwater resource?
Higher tech coal plants produce 90 percent less ash. Efficiency gains and renewables create no toxic ash.

Global Warming

The plant would emit about 8.7 million tons of carbon dioxide every year. The planet is already warming, and seas are already rising. Santee Cooper has said it will one day investigate reducing carbon emissions from coal; the best way is to pursue energy that does not produce millions of tons of carbon dioxide and contribute to warming.
The nation’s largest utilities, companies, and banks are already factoring the high costs of controlling carbon dioxide in their investment decisions. Santee Cooper, meanwhile, is building a coal plant with no known means of carbon capture and has said not one public word about the balloon payment that will come due when it must pay to control or offset 8.7 million tons of carbon a year. How much will the balloon payment be, and who will pay it?
South Carolina’s coastal tourism industry is worth $11 billion per year. The reason people come to the “Grand Strand” is because of the beach and the serene environment. What will rising sea levels, more violent hurricanes, and more polluted air do to tourism? Coastal tourism is the goose laying this area’s golden eggs. A dirty coal plant would be an albatross.