Clean Air & Energy Campaign
- Sierra Club vs KCP&L - Big Win for Kansas City Area Residents
- CU’s permit appeal moves to MO Court of Appeals
- Sierra Club Intervenes in PSC’s utility regulatory determinations
With 2005 the worst storm season ever in the U.S. some believe we may have reached a tipping point for global warming. Summer 2006 could prove to be a tipping point for our nation — finally facing the world emergency posed by global warming and embracing clean energy solutions to move us toward greater energy security and meaningful actions to address climate change.
Al Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth opened in June gaining momentum just before a deadly heat wave hit much of the country in July. It now ranks as the third highest grossing U.S. documentary film even though it has only opened in 587 theatres compared to 2506 for the number two documentary March of the Penguins. The movie provides graphic and scientific illustrations of the fact that global warming is a man-made phenomenon that could set the course for irrevocable changes to the Earth’s climate and ecosystems during our lifetime.
While the Bush administration continues to keep its head in the sand and its energy policies moving in the wrong direction, we can only hope the facts of global warming are heating up that sand, making them very uncomfortable and moving them a bit closer to facing the truth. In the mean time, in the absence of national leadership, cities and states are moving forward to address energy and global warming issues on their own with innovative energy solutions that move us toward a safer and more secure future.
Sierra Club’s national Cool Cities Campaign, active in Missouri, continues to encourage local leaders to commit to stopping global warming by signing the U.S. Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement. Once signed, local campaign activists help cities turn their commitments into action by pushing for smart energy solutions.
California is taking on global warming on its own. Governor Schwarzenegger recently signed legislation that calls for a 25 percent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020. Other states are moving forward on initiatives for efficiency standards, renewable energy portfolio requirements and global warming gas reductions.
Missouri’s Clean Air & Energy Campaign
Here at home, Ozark Chapter’s Clean Air & Energy Campaign is helping Missouri choose a clean energy future, and do its part to curb global warming. Missouri’s coal-reliant utility industry and too many visionless or lazy public officials continue to close their minds to global warming and the economic advantages of investing in a clean energy future. So our first priority must be to stop new coal-burning power plants from being built while we encourage clean, safe and reliable energy options to meet our future energy needs. The reality is that once a new coal-burning power plant is built it will be our energy option for the next 40–50 years. When utilities build huge coal plants they build excess capacity that effectively shuts out the development of cheaper and cleaner energy alternatives. When the Public Service Commission (PSC) approves of a new coal-burning power plant they lock rate payers into paying for the plant itself and all future regulatory requirements. So the cost of future controls on carbon dioxide (global warming gas), mercury and particulates that cause serious and widely recognized health and environmental issues will be borne by the rate payer.
Ozark Chapter is the only group that has comprehensively taken on utilities in the state to demand clean energy solutions for our future energy needs. With our partners at Great Rivers Environmental Law Center and Washington University Interdisciplinary Environmental Law Clinic, we have challenged the utility industry’s reliance on rubber-stamp bureaucratic processes by intervening in the public interest with administrative and court challenges to their self-serving plans for the state’s energy future. (See the summary of “Public Interest Litigation & Regulatory Challenges” in this newsletter)
Two utilities, Kansas City Power & Light (KCPL) and City Utilities (CU) in Springfield have had their plans stalled for building new coal-burning power plants for three years and three and one half years respectively (See boxes: “Sierra Club vs KCP&L, BIG WIN for Kansas City Area Residents!” & “CU Permit Errors and Future Pollution Levels Prompt Sierra Club Appeal.”) We have also held up plans for new coal-burning power plants that are waiting for the KCPL and CU outcomes before they move forward. Still other utilities have submitted their long-term integrated resource plans to the Public Service Commission (PSC) that include coal or even nuclear as their primary energy source with little emphasis on efficiency and renewable energy. In order to even review a utility’s integrated resource plans we must formally “intervene” in the PSC process.
If these utility companies continue to move forward with their plans to build dirty coal-burning power plants in which they are unaccountable for external environmental and public health costs, we will continue to be the public’s WATCHDOG to ensure they follow the law at every step of the process for obtaining permits and authorization to build (Missouri Department of Natural Resources, U.S. Corps of Engineers, Missouri Public Service Commission, etc): Clean Air Act requirements for using Best Available Control Technology; public disclosure requirements; public hearing requirements; wetlands remediation; responsibility to ratepayers, etc.
In addition to public interest litigation our multifaceted approach also includes on the ground, volunteer, grassroots campaigns to draw in support and educate the public concerning energy issues. Missouri’s Sierra Club Groups active in Kansas City, Springfield, St. Louis and Columbia have created and participated in a multitude of projects over many years to move their regions toward a clean energy future. In addition, Kansas City, Springfield, St. Louis, and their surrounding communities, are organized in opposition to the coal-burning power plants planned for their regions. There are Sierra Club members active in smaller Missouri communities working to stop the next wave of coal-power plant proposals as well. Adding to that are many valued and courageous coalition partners that have joined the campaign.
And we can’t forget our donors. Sierra Club donors are an integral part of our work in Missouri. We run low budget grassroots campaigns, but even with pro bono attorneys and other significant discounts we receive, litigation is quite expensive. Every donation counts because Sierra Club does not accept or seek corporate donations except under the strictest guidelines. Nor does Sierra Club accept any government grants or monies.