UC Power Plant

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Updates on the UC Power Plant

EPA cites University of Cincinnati for clean-air violations

Ohio EPA News Release date: 09/12/2006

Contact Information: William Omohundro, (312) 353-8254, omohundro.william@epa.gov

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
No. 06-OPA159

CHICAGO (Sept. 12, 2006) - U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 has cited the University of Cincinnati for alleged clean-air violations at the university's power plant at 3001 Vine St., Cincinnati, Ohio.

EPA alleges that 2004 and 2005 data from continuous monitors at the university's boiler and turbines show that opacity or the amount of light obscured by particulates (smoke, dust, ash) as well as nitrogen oxide and carbon monoxide emissions exceeded limits in federal and state regulations and in the university's state operating and construction permits.

"EPA's mission is to protect public health and the environment," said Acting Regional Administrator Bharat Mathur. "We will take whatever steps are needed to ensure compliance with the Clean Air Act."

These are preliminary findings of violations. To resolve them, EPA may issue a compliance order, assess an administrative penalty or bring suit against the company. The University of Cincinnati has 30 days from receipt of the notice to meet with EPA to discuss resolving the allegations.

Inhaling high concentrations of particulates can affect children, the elderly and people with heart and lung diseases the most.

Nitrogen oxides contribute to the formation of ground-level ozone, or smog. Smog is formed when a mixture of air pollutants is baked in the hot summer sun. Smog can cause a variety of respiratory problems, including coughing and wheezing, shortness of breath and chest pain. People with asthma, children and the elderly are especially at risk, but these concerns are important to everyone.

When carbon monoxide enters the bloodstream, it reduces delivery of oxygen to the body's organs and tissues. Exposure to high levels of carbon monoxide can impair vision, hand movement, learning ability, performance of complex tasks, and can cause death.

MAY 2004

Turbines have been installed in the power plant, and are being tested. As of yet, no decision has been rendere by the Environmental Review Appeals Commission. President Nancy Zimpher,in a recent communication with a concerned citizen, stated that she would not discuss the issue while the appeal is pending.

NOVEMBER 2003

Our attorney in the permit appeal, Richard Sahli, submitted the final hearing brief in early November. The Environmental Review Appeals Commission may take between two weeks and six months to issue its decision on the appeal. In the meantime, we need to raise funds to pay our technical consultant. Help us RETIRE THE DEBT. Your donation will help pay off this project undertaken for the health and welfare of the community.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

The new UC President, Nancy Zimpher, has expressed a strong wish to work in partnership with the local communities that neighbor the university. If you are concerned about how the pollution from the new power plant will affect your health and quality of life, please let President Zimpher know. You can email her or write her at: UC President Nancy Zimpher, University Hall, Box 210063, Cincinnati, OH 45221-0063.

OCTOBER 2003

The Environmental Review Appeals Commission heard our appeal of the permit. The hearing lasted for about a week in early-mid October.

JUNE 2003

While construction on UC's power plant, at the corner of short Vine and MLK, continues apace, ECO's appeal of the permit also continues. We are appealing the Ohio EPA's permit which allows the university to build this plant and operate it without any pollution controls for 225 tons per year of nitrogen oxides, and 16 tons per year of soot.

The main goal of our appeal: to get the Ohio EPA to revise the permit and require UC to abide by the Clean Air Act, specifically, to install the best available pollution controls on the plant. At this time the university has no plan to control the nitrogen oxides, nor the soot, that will be emitted by the facility. They do have controls for carbon monoxide. An independent engineer has reviewed UC's rationale for rejecting the best available pollution controls, and has found UC's reasoning to be seriously flawed.

We know that UC rejected the controls claiming the cost was prohibitive, yet an article in the UC News Record (student paper)from March 2003 reports that UC will save $8 million per year by using this plant. We know that UC Vice President James Tucker has promised that there is room on the power plant for add-on pollution controls. The link below, http://www.newsrecord.uc.edu/read.asp?ID=12784 , is to the article in the UC News Record. Here is an excerpt from that article: "In summing up UC's commitment to environmental issues, Tucker made a promise: "If someone comes up with a proven technology, we'll install it." We know that there IS a proven technology to capture the 225 tons of smog-forming nitrogen oxides, and that it has been in use for two years now at the University of California/San Diego's award-winning power plant.(By the way, the article contains an error: the oxides of nitrogen to be emitted by the plant are serious respiratory toxins, and not "laughing gas" as the author states.)

We need to raise funds to pay the costs of a technical expert for the appeal. We have a very generous matching donation of $1000, contributed by a concerned professor emeritus of UC. Our goal is to raise $3000 to cover costs.

If you would like to contribute toward this effort, and help us get the matching grant, you can make checks out to Environmental Community Organization. Please note on the check that it's for the "UC Power Plant Legal Fund."

Environmental Community Organization (ECO)
515 Wyoming Ave.
Cincinnati OH 45215

Please direct any questions about this to Karen Arnett, Project Coordinator, 761-6140 ext. 14

Other news
In January 2003, the UC Student Senate unanimously passed a resolution regarding the power plant. The student reps were very concerned with UC's lack of appropriate pollution controls on the plant, especially given the nearby residential area. They called upon the university to adopt best pollution controls.

JANUARY 2003

The city's Environmental Advisory Council (EAC) sent a letter to council last fall strongly critical of UC's lack of pollution controls for the plant, but the issue got lost in the budget shuffle. Members of the EAC were to meet with Minette Cooper (chair of the committee which deals with environmental issues) regarding the power plant, but Councilwoman Cooper cancelled in the last minute. The group rescheduled with Ms. Cooper and was again cancelled last minute.

The University of Cincinnati Student Senate in January unanimously passed a resolution calling on UC to adopt best pollution controls for this power plant. The text of this "smokestack bill" will be posted here soon.

UC Student Senate Resolution supports ECO's efforts

The university continues to observe its gag rule, and refuses to answer questions from the public regarding the power plant, citing the "lawsuit" -- a citizen appeal of the EPA permit to the Environmental Review Appeals Commission. This morning the Air Committee Co-Chair of the Cincinnati Environmental Advisory Council (EAC) tried to find out if the turbines had been delivered, and was met with silence from university officials. At UC's request, the hearing for the appeal has been delayed until October 2003; it seems that the university wishes to proceed with its construction without having to answer any questions about the project.

The City of Cincinnati has eliminated its Office of Environmental Management, so there will be no hope for relief from the city, should the air pollution from the plant prove to be a problem for the community. The plant is permitted to emit 16 tons per year of soot, which is more than the current total emissions of soot from the campus facilities. Soot is known to be a greater health hazard than ozone, causing lung cancer and heart disease, as well as respiratory ailments.

SEPTEMBER 2002

UC is building a power plant that will provide all or most of the campus' electricity needs, and steam for the campus. It is called a "co-generation" plant, because the steam it will generate produces both electricity and heat for the buildings. Other local customers, such as the hospital complex, may also purchase electric power from UC.

The large quantity of its emissions put this facility in the same regulatory category as the coal burning power plants along the Ohio River. The Ohio EPA issued a permit to UC on August 15, 2002, and this permit allows the plant to emit 225 tons per year of nitrogen oxides, a smog precursor. The plant is also permitted to emit 16 tons per year of soot.

The law requires that UC use the best available pollution controls for nitrogen oxides and for soot. UC is in fact using no controls at all for soot, claiming that a filter would be prohibitively expensive. Additionally, UC did not use current information in its assessment of pollution controls for nitrogen oxides. Ohio EPA is in part responsible for this violation of the Clean Air Act's requirements.

Another university has been operating an almost identical power plant with the best available pollution controls for nitrogen oxides: University of California - San Diego (UCSD) has operated its cogeneration facility since June 2001. The amount of nitrogen oxides it emits, using the same turbines that Univ of Cincinnati will be installing, is one tenth to one hundredth the amount that UC has chosen to emit.

UCSD has won environmental recognition and awards for its use of the very cleanest pollution controls. At the same time, the university states that it saves $3 million per year with this new plant. This means UCSD's pollution controls are cost effective and feasible. (see attached article or go to http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/newsrel/general/dcleanairaward.htm)

University of Cincinnati has an opportunity to use this same control technology, called SCONOX, and by doing so, it would do the best possible job of "doing its share for cleaner air" in Cincinnati. The university would set a good example for other institutions in our region, modeling the very best available smog-preventing controls. This technology also, incidentally, removes soot, carbon monoxide, and organic compounds such as formaldehyde (produced by natural gas turbines).

The University of Cincinnati needs your encouragement and support to make the right choice, for the health of our city, and the health of future generations of Cincinnatians. It is not too late for your input. University officials have begun to inquire into this technology, of which they were unaware until Sept 10. Your support may be what they need to adopt this technology.

The Cincinnati City Council is unaware of this project, and of the opportunity UC has to contribute to cleaner air in our city. Our mayor also needs to know that, while this project has the potential to be a good thing, it can only be environmentally sound and sustainable if the best pollution controls are used. The difference between 225 tons of nitrogen oxide and 25 or even 2 tons is significant for our already smog-filled air and lungs. Smog is a regional problem, and the choice to invest in the best pollution controls will benefit counties downwind, who receive our pollution.

EXTRA INFORMATION (so that you may field some of the responses you might hear from UC)

The University of Cincinnati maintains that this plant will "help the environment". The argument is that this plant will replace all of the old boilers which have historically been used to generate steam for campus heating. Yet the university has not removed the old boilers from its permit with the Environmental Protection Agency. The university has, to the contrary, told the EPA that it wants to retain its old boilers as back up units. Thus, there is no guarantee that total pollution from the university will decrease as dramatically as the University claims.

Thus, the only appropriate thing to do is to guarantee that the new equipment will operate as cleanly as is possible. UC San Diego's choice sets the example.

UC has made the argument that it is beneficial for our air quality to make electricity from natural gas, instead of buying Cinergy's coal-produced electricity. This is false economic reasoning. There is no reason to believe that Cinergy will stop producing the amount of power that UC buys, once it loses UC as a customer. It only makes business sense that Cinergy will try to find another customer(s) for that power, and therefore coal-produced energy will not decrease after UC begins to produce its own power.

Last year, the city's official position, guided by assessments by the Office of Environmental Management, was that UC's choice not to use proper pollution controls was of grave import to the city's air quality. This year, Mayor Luken did a complete reversal of this position, and unconditionally supported the power plant as is. The reason for this reversal of position is unknown.

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