Baltimore Calls for Maryland to Move Beyond Coal

Baltimore, MD-- Baltimore City Councilmember Kristerfer Burnett (District 8), in partnership with the Sierra Club, introduced a resolution today calling for the Maryland General Assembly to pass, and Governor Hogan to sign, legislation establishing a clear and enforceable commitment to move Maryland beyond coal-fired power and create a Coal Community Transition Fund to support impacted communities and workers. The fund would support investments in job retraining and assistance for those affected, as well as increased investments in clean energy sources that will provide good-paying, local jobs.

“Climate Change is real, and it should motivate us all to act,” Councilman Kristerfer Burnett said. “We now live in a time when 20th century energy needs are now being met with 21st Century technologies. We should no longer have to suffer higher asthma rates and smog pollution to power our homes, not when renewable energies are becoming safer and more reliable by the day. Baltimore City and Maryland can and should, wind down our coal power plants and build up a workforce capable of thriving in the new, necessary Green Economy.”

Baltimore City has recently become a front-runner in progressive environmental policy with the passing of the oil export terminal ban last year. After leading the fight on fossil fuels locally, the city and, Councilmember Burnett, are now calling on MD to move beyond coal-fired power to protect the health of its residents. Both the Herbert Wagner and Brandon Shores coal plants are located near the city. Currently, the Herbert Wagner plant is operating without state of the art pollution controls for harmful sulfur dioxide pollution and contributes to our smog problem by pumping out nitrogen oxides. Coincidentally, asthma hospitalization rates in Baltimore City double the state average and are nearly three times higher than the U.S. average.

“Marylanders have suffered from the toxic pollutants of coal-fired power for too long. As coal power declines across the country we need Maryland to show true leadership,” David Smedick Maryland Campaign and Policy Representative at the Sierra Club said. “Our state needs to establish timelines and plans to commit to moving beyond coal and help communities during this transition to ensure they are prospering in the clean energy economy. We need a comprehensive funding package for impacted workers and a diverse, renewable energy economy that provides worker training programs and good, family-wage union jobs.”

In 2017, the six coal plants operating in Maryland pumped out the same amount of climate pollution as over 1,900,000 cars, or over 40 percent of the passenger cars on the road in the state. The Brandon Shores plant routinely discharges arsenic, selenium, and mercury into local waterways at levels beyond the EPA’s federal safe limits. These toxic metals are dumped directly into the Patapsco River, which mixes with the water in the city harbor.

"Burning coal is a major source of hazardous air pollutants, such as arsenic, chromium lead, nickel and other metals. Once these toxins, along with others, are emitted from coal plants, the risk of heart attacks, strokes and lung cancer also increases,” Tim Whitehouse, the Executive Director of Chesapeake Physicians for Social Responsibility said. “Smaller than 1/20th the width of a human hair, fine particulate matter are carried deep into the lungs, where they can cross into the bloodstream and eventually settle in the body and cause harm."

States such as Washington and Massachusetts have led the way in developing a process to move beyond coal while providing direct financial support for impacted workers and communities. With the current economical hardships facing coal plants, Maryland should act now by creating a Coal Community Transition program that charts our course off of the fossil fuel and provides job retraining assistance to impacted workers allowing them to re-enter the workforce in a timely manner, support the growth of clean energy projects in impacted communities and add new, family-sustaining, union jobs to the local clean energy economy.