NEWBURGH — Vectren Corp. plans to spend $110 million to install pollution controls on two southwestern Indiana power plants that environmentalists have cited for excessive emissions.
The Evansville-based utility wants to install pollution controls at two plants near Newburgh, one of which is jointly owned with Alcoa. The company said the plans will reduce mercury, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions by 2010.
“We’re ahead of other utilities, and we kind of hang our hats on that,” Vectren spokeswoman Chase Kelley said Wednesday. “We live and we work here, so protecting the environment is definitely top on our agenda.”
The company this week filed the plans with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to bring the coal-fired generating stations about 10 miles east of Evansville in compliance with federal emissions requirements.
The commission can change, reject or accept in full the plan.
Vectren delivers natural gas and electricity to more than 1 million customers in an area that covers nearly two-thirds of Indiana and west-central Ohio. To pay for the changes, Vectren estimates its residential customers’ electric bills will increase by 6 percent to 8 percent over several years.
But some environmentalists suggest such increases may be too large.
John Blair, president of Valley Watch, a regional environmental group, said the announcement would create jobs, improve public health and be a “welcome step forward” for plants with emissions problems.
Still, the rate increase seemed larger than it should when efforts to reduce emissions at other plants have brought smaller increases, he said. This week’s announcement follows earlier plans to spend $244 million adding pollution controls to Vectren’s four largest generating stations to reduce ozone-causing nitrogen oxide emissions. Those controls increased typical residential bills by about 22 percent when phased in fully.
The plans do not include efforts to control carbon dioxide emissions, Blair said. The greenhouse gas is blamed for global warming.
Source: The Associated Press
- CBCSD and Members Participated and Suggested on the Project for Technical Regulation on Low-carbon Pilot Community
- CBCSD and Members Participated in the APEC Cooperation Network Construction Forum of Green Supply Chain
- Calculation Method of CO2 Emissions in Petroleum and Natural Gas Exploitation Enterprises & Calculation Method of CO2 Emissions in Water Network of Chemical Enterprises
- CBCSD Attended the Workshop for Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development and Delivered Introductions
- WBCSD: Tackling the Challenge, How to Make Informed Choices on Forest Product?
- The National New-Type Urbanization Plan Released, Board Members of CBCSD Help the Sustainable Development of Cities
- Board members of CBCSD Actively Participated in the Carbon Trading and International Climate Change Process
- Two industrial Standards Compiled by CBCSD Passed Examination
- Widespread Use of the Achievements Businesses Energy Saving and Greenhouse Gas Management
- CBCSD held Chemical industry enterprise value chain (range 3) greenhouse gas emissions, accounting and reporting guidelines
