DOMINION POST Thursday 22 December 2011:

UPDATE

Longview Power Plant up and running

$2B facility producing 700 megawatts a day

BY ALEX LANG
The Dominion Post

Longview Power Plant, is now just that — a power plant.
General Manager Charlie Huguenard said the plant, north of Morgantown, reached substantial competition last week, meaning most of the work is done.
   Crews will continue to do minor work, testing and repairs as needed, Huguenard said. But, the Longview power staff has taken control of the coal-to-electricity facility.
   The facility cost about $2 billion to build.
   The plant is generating electricity 24 hours a day, Huguenard said. Each day, 700 megawatts — enough to power 7 million 100-watt bulbs — go into the electrical grid. The plant sells its energy to PJM Interconnection.
   There was a delay in reaching substantial competition as the contractor had to fix a few issues, such as problems with the boiler, Huguenard said.
   As part of the commissioning process, the plant performed emissions tests, which Huguenard said went smoothly.
   To get a permit, the state’s Department of Environmental Protection gave it the lowest permitted air emissions rating to date. The plant is the lowest airemissions plant in the state, if not one of the lowest in the country, Huguenard said.
   Not everybody was pleased with the plant, however. Chairman of the state’s Sierra Club Executive Committee, Jim Sconyers, said the group battled the plant, but lost.
   Despite the company’s environmental claims, Sconyers said people should be concerned about the emissions from a coal facility.
   “You can only be so clean, if you’re burning coal to make electricity,” Sconyers said. There is a bit of a bright side, he added.
   As part of the settlement with the Sierra Club, the Longview Power Plant will begin to donate $500,000 to nonprofit organizations to cover the costs of helping to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions and to take care of local waterways.
   The plant has 96 full-time workers who are based in Morgantown, Huguenard said. The company estimates the plant will increase state and local revenues by roughly $7.9 million a year and boost annual labor income in local counties by $43 million.
   Now that the plant has reached substantial completion, Huguenard said he plans to remain with the project to oversee the transition from construction to operations.

Longview Power acquires plant

12/22/2011 3:32 AM

Longview Power has accepted ownership of the 695-megawatt, coal-fired plant it constructed in Monongalia County, W.Va., just south of the Greene County border.

The company accepted ownership from the plant's main contractors after it was the determined the plant had achieved "substantial completion," said a news release issued by the company.

The main contractors on the $2 billion project were Kvaerner North American Construction Inc. and Siemens Energy Inc.

The plant had begun producing electricity in May and since that time has been going through numerous tests in preparation for commercial operations.

"During the development, construction and commissioning of this complex facility, we have successfully met highly rigorous standards and requirements for operational performance, environmental compliance and safety," said Charlie Huguenard, Longview general manager.

"We look forward to productive and sustained commercial operation of the facility for decades to come," he said.

The plant was first proposed in late 2002, and after all permits were received, a process that included lengthy legal challenges to its air-quality permit, groundbreaking was held in May 2007.

The plant will operate under the lowest permitted air emission limits imposed by West Virginia for a coal-fired plant, the company said.

At full load, the plant will burn about 6,600 tons of coal a day, most of it mined in Greene County at mines owned by Mepco LLC, a parent company of Dana Mining Co.

The coal is conveyed to the plant by means of a 4.5-mile coal conveyor belt constructed from Dana's 4 West Mine near Bobtown to the power plant.

The plant also will use water for cooling drawn from the Monongahela River and treated at a plant the company constructed near Poland Mines.

The Longview plant is the largest privately funded project in West Virginia history. It is staffed by 96 full-time employees and generates an additional 500 indirect jobs in the region, the company said.

EPA acts to make air cleaner

New rules force oil-, coal-fired power plants to lower pollutants periling health

Thursday, December 22, 2011

By Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

In one of its most significant initiatives in 20 years, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced final health-based rules Wednesday for controlling mercury, acid gases and other air toxics from oil- and coal-burning power plants.

The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will save 11,000 lives and prevent 4,700 heart attacks and 130,000 childhood asthma attacks a year by 2016, according to the EPA, while reducing respiratory ailments, birth defects and cancers.

And, according to the Electric Power Generation Association of Pennsylvania, while the new standards may contribute to the retirement of eight to 10 small, old, coal-fired power plants in the state, it likely will not cause any power blackouts and should open the way for development of more natural gas-fueled power plants.

The first national emissions controls on utilities will reduce emissions of mercury -- a potent neurotoxin -- arsenic, chromium, lead, nickel and acid gases from power plants by 91 percent. Every dollar spent to reduce power plant pollution, the EPA said, will result in up to $9 in public health benefits, and the total health and economic benefits resulting from the long-awaited standards could be as much as $90 billion annually.

"By cutting emissions that are linked to developmental disorders and respiratory illnesses like asthma, these standards represent a major victory for clean air and public health -- and especially for the health of our children," EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said in Washington, D.C. "With these standards that were two decades in the making, EPA is rounding out a year of incredible progress on clean air in America with another action that will benefit the American people for years to come."

Ms. Jackson said the toxics pollution controls could increase utility bills by $3 to $4 a month for consumers. The rules might also cause utilities to close some of the nation's oldest and biggest polluting power plants.

The new standards were not welcomed by many in the utility and coal industries.

Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, a coalition of utilities that lobbies on electric power issues in Washington, D.C., and Steve Miller, president and chief executive officer of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, said the EPA's rules will increase the cost of power, cause job losses, and have few health benefits.

The rules, however, were praised by environmental, health, science, sportsmen's, investment, sustainable business and religious organizations, and even some electric utilities. Some called the rules "long overdo" and "monumental" and "historic" in their positive impacts on public health, the environment and the economy.

"As a result of the new standards, we will begin to see some relief from the power plant pollution that harms our health," said Deborah Brown, president and CEO of the American Lung Association of Pennsylvania. "This action is a significant victory in the fight for healthy air."

Bill McLin, president and CEO of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, a not-for-profit health organization advocating for asthma sufferers, said the 20 million Americans with asthma, including 6.7 million children, will breathe easier because of the EPA's decision to control power plant emissions.

Coal-fired power plants are the largest sources of mercury, arsenic and other hazardous air pollutants. After intense industry lobbying, coal- and oil-fired electric power generators were exempted from 1990 Clean Air Act regulations governing toxic air emissions from other industrial operations.

Today, about 44 percent of the nation's more than 440 coal-fired power plants continue to operate without any pollution controls and are responsible for 99 percent of mercury emissions from the electric power industry.

The new Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or MATS, contain two rules. The first establishes numerical limitations for mercury, airborne particles or soot, hydrochloric acid and metals. The second rule tightens limits that new coal-fired power plants must meet for airborne particle, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emissions.

The new rules, based on more than 130 peer-reviewed scientific and health studies, give power plants that don't use controls three years to install the equipment, with a possible additional one-year extension. In addition, the rules provide for case-by-case extensions where necessary to ensure that electricity supply reliability is maintained.

According to the EPA, the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards and the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, which was issued earlier this year, are the most significant steps to clean up pollution from power plant smokestacks since the Acid Rain Program of the 1990s. Combined, the rules annually could prevent up to 46,000 premature deaths, 540,000 asthma attacks among children and 24,500 emergency room visits and hospital admissions.

Power plant mercury controls already exist in 17 states, but not in Pennsylvania, where a mercury rule was declared unconstitutional by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2009.

A Natural Resources Defense Council report in July listed Pennsylvania as having the second-worst toxic air emissions in the nation, behind Ohio, and Pennsylvania's mercury emissions are second to Texas. Mark Baird, a spokesman for GenOn, owner of 18 power plants in Pennsylvania, said the company wouldn't comment on the rules until it has an opportunity to examine them in detail.

FirstEnergy, which owns four coal-fired power plants in Pennsylvania, including Hatfield's Ferry power plant in Greene County and Bruce Mansfield power plant in Shippingport, Beaver County, also said it is reviewing the rules. When the rules were proposed earlier this year, FirstEnergy estimated compliance costs at $2 billion to $3 billion.

"Over the next few months we'll evaluate things and look at our individual units to determine what they need to do to meet the regulations," said Ray Evans, environment executive director for FirstEnergy. "We have scrubbers on most all of the units but some might need retrofits."

Mr. Segal, of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, and Mr. Miller, of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, said the EPA's rules will also make electricity less reliable. And just two months ago, Gov. Tom Corbett joined 10 other Republican governors in signing a letter to President Barack Obama asking him to withdraw the rules because of power supply reliability concerns.

But most national studies don't support that blackout warning, and Doug Biden, president of the Electric Power Generation Association in Pennsylvania, a Harrisburg association representing power producers statewide, said such an occurrence is very unlikely in Pennsylvania.

Mr. Biden said he does expect eight to 10 coal-fired power plants to close in the next few years, reducing Pennsylvania's power output by 3,000 to 4,000 megawatts, from its current total output of about 50,000 megawatts. He said he doesn't know which individual plants might close.

"I do expect significant retirements of coal power plants, but I'm not blaming the EPA's air toxics rules ...," Mr. Biden said. "When you look at everything together, the new rules, historically low natural gas prices and stubbornly high coal prices due to overseas demand, all of that makes it very difficult for companies to justify operation of small, older power plants."

Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1983.

First published on December 22, 2011 at 12:00 am

Charleston Gazette Thursday 22 December 2011:

December 21, 2011

Engineers hired to develop Kanawha cracker plant

By Paul J. Nyden

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Richard Neely, a Charleston lawyer and former state Supreme Court justice, announced Wednesday that two experienced engineers are working with him on his plans to design and build a cracker plant near Montgomery to process natural gas.

Neely recently incorporated Invictus LLC, whose cracking plant will produce a variety of products, including diesel fuel, gasoline, naphtha and ethylene -- a major product used by the plastics industry.

The two engineers are:

* Rob Proffitt, who lives in Winfield, was project manager for Union Carbide when it built a $1.3 billion ethane cracker plant in Alberta, Canada, between 1996 and 2001.

The Alberta plant was a joint venture between Carbide and Nova Chemicals.

* Cyril B. Tellis, who has a doctorate in chemical engineering from Northwestern University, was a research and development manager for Carbide's facilities that produced and refined ethylene and propylene, as well as a number of chemical derivatives.

Neely said Tellis, who now lives in Charleston, worked for a variety of projects, including a major cracking plant in Saudi Arabia that supplies ethylene for plastics throughout Europe and coal-to-gas Sasol plants in South Africa.

Sasol Ltd. is a South African company involved in mining, energy, chemicals and synfuels. During the apartheid era, when many countries boycotted trade with South Africa, Sasol produced petroleum and diesel products from coal and natural gas.

Neely estimates it would cost $1.5 billion to build a cracking plant that produces high-quality products for the chemical industry and $3 billion for a plant that produces gasoline and diesel fuel from natural gas.

The proposed plant could possibly get wet natural gas reserves pipelined to Kanawha County from both Marcellus Shale reserves in northern West Virginia and Utica Shale reserves in Athens County and surrounding areas in eastern Ohio.

"People are going after oil in Utica Shale reserves. They are not looking for gas," Neely said. "And Ohio will not let you flare natural gas [to eliminate it] after 30 days from the time you open a well."

The two engineers are:

"We will be willing to take that gas, wet gas, which has to go to some kind of a plant," Neely said. "People might come and beg us to get rid of their gas."

Invictus has already acquired the rights to 1,456 acres of land to build its cracking plant and related facilities near Coalburg, between Montgomery and Cabin Creek.

Most of the facilities will be built on land that was previously a mountaintop removal coal mine.

The Kanawha Valley, Neely said, is a good place to develop the cracking plant, especially with its long chemical-industry history.

"We have everyone from smart blue-collar guys to chemical engineers with PhDs. We will also provide union-wage jobs.

"Here, there is a far greater reserve of people who know about the chemical industry than farther north, where they have steel and aluminum plants and other heavy industry."

Neely said the CSX railroad, which has tracks between the Kanawha River and the proposed location of the new Invictus plant, will make it easy to ship the plant's products to Newport News, Va., for export.

"CSX also connects to places throughout the industrial Midwestern heartland to cities like Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Gary."

The cracking plant will also have access to a river dock that can handle eight barges.

Reach Paul J. Nyden at pjny...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-5164.

THE STATE JOURNAL:

EPA announces new clean air standards for coal and oil power plants

Posted: Dec 21, 2011 11:26 AM EST Updated: Dec 21, 2011 5:18 PM EST

By Pam Kasey

New limits on power plant emissions of mercury and other air toxics and a three-year compliance timeline remain essentially as proposed in March in a long-expected U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule issued Dec. 21.

"With these standards that were two decades in the making, EPA is rounding out a year of incredible progress on clean air in America with another action that will benefit the American people for years to come," said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. "The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will protect millions of families and children from harmful and costly air pollution and provide the American people with health benefits that far outweigh the costs of compliance."

The MATS rule — also known as the Hazardous Air Pollutants rule for utilities and the Utility Maximum Available Control Technology rule — establishes the first national standards to limit toxic air emissions from power plants.

The rule is expected to cut mercury emissions by 90 percent and also to cut emissions of arsenic, chromium, nickel, and acid gases including hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid. The technology that controls those emissions also will reduce fine particulate matter.

Mercury is a neurotoxin to which fetuses and children are particularly susceptible, while other targeted emissions cause cancer, chronic and acute respiratory disorders, and other illnesses.

The compliance deadline is Jan. 1, 2015.

Changes in the Final Rule

The rule was issued several days after it was expected on Friday, Dec. 16, leading to speculation that it was being weakened in the final hours.

Changes, however, were minor and kept the emissions limits and the three-year timeline essentially as proposed.

Most notably, estimated costs and benefits dropped — from costs of about $11 billion per year in the proposed rule and benefits of up to $140 billion, to $9.7 and up to $90 billion in the final rule — but that's not the result of weakening, according to Jackson.

Costs dropped due to efficiencies suggested by some of the 900,000 commenters on the proposal, she said. Benefits were reduced because analysis showed that some of the benefits will be realized through the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule issued earlier this year.

MATS benefits occur primarily through as many as 11,000 premature deaths avoided per year but also through the avoidance of 4,700 non-fatal heart attacks, 130,000 cases of respiratory illness including aggravated asthma and acute and chronic bronchitis, and 540,000 days of missed work, according to the EPA.

In addition, the EPA's jobs analysis finds a net gain of 46,000 short-term jobs as pollution control technologies are installed and 8,000 long-term jobs to operate and maintain those technologies.

Plant Closures Expected

Based on the draft rule and other environmental rules expected or already out, utilities have said they would close some plants that are too small and old to merit expensive retrofits. More than 30 plants in a dozen states likely will be retired and another 34 may retire, according to an Associated Press survey based on the draft rule and reported on Dec. 19.

In West Virginia, AEP has said it expects this rule, with other EPA regulations, to lead to the closure of its Philip Sporn plant in Mason County, Kanawha River plant in Kanawha County and Kammer plant in Marshall County. Those three plants amount to 2,200 megawatts of older coal-fired generating capacity — 12 percent of the state's generating capacity but only about one-tenth of 1 percent of generation in 2010.

FirstEnergy has not yet announced its plans.

"We would need some time to evaluate what the final rules are and how they might impact our operations," said FirstEnergy spokesman Mark Durbin. "At this time, no final decisions have been made on the future of our fossil generating plants."

A state regulator has suggested that FirstEnergy's small, old Albright, Rivesville and Willow Island plants may be retired. Those total about 600 megawatts of capacity and represented much less than one-tenth of one percent of generation in 2010.

Utilities, regulators and electric trade organizations raised concerns that the combined capacity of plant retirements expected from the proposed rule and the tight timeline could lead to reliability problems.

The AP concluded after its survey that the concern likely was overblown; however, the EPA provided in its final rule for a fourth compliance year for technology installations and further flexibility for localized reliability problems.

Reactions

The National Mining Association belittled the flexibility as inadequate.

"The modest adjustment to the compliance timeline in the MACT standard merely papers over a deeply flawed rule," said NMA President and CEO Hal Quinn in a media release.

But PJM Interconnection, which manages the grid in a 13-state region that includes West Virginia, supported the flexibility measures.

"We at PJM are pleased that the EPA administrator has included the key elements of our proposed process to preserve reliability into documents accompanying the final rule," the organization wrote in a media release.

The Sierra Club applauded the rule as a "milestone."

And the sustainability advocacy group CERES said the rule would "unleash investment" in infrastructure and create jobs up and down the supply chain.

Soon after the EPA made its announcement, Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., issued a statement in which he said he had "serious concerns" about the new rules.

"In fact, I have voted in Congress to prevent their implementation in the near term. The rules are likely to drive up energy prices for American consumers and result in the loss of jobs for coal miners while doing nothing to address the growth in global emissions," he said. "It certainly makes more sense to me to be investing in American-made technologies to help American utilities upgrade to more efficient, cleaner ways of using domestic coal, rather than putting the rulemaking hammer to American plants and forcing our coal to be shipped overseas where emissions will be even greater. From the standpoint sufficiency of our energy supply and protection of our global atmosphere, we ought to be looking creatively at coal power, rather than instituting policies that force coal out of our energy sector."

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., also was critical of the rules.

"Today's announcement of yet another onerous rule by the EPA completely ignores the devastating impact these regulations will have on jobs and our economy, not only in West Virginia but across this nation," he said. "The Utility MACT Rule, combined with the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule that was finalized earlier this year, are two of the most expensive regulations ever to be imposed, and every American should be concerned about their effect on energy prices, the reliability of our power supply, our coal mining industry and most importantly our families," Senator Manchin said. "I believe we can find a responsible and reasonable balance when it comes to the environment and our energy needs as a nation. My desire to achieve this balance is why my Republican colleague Dan Coats of Indiana and I introduced the Fair Compliance Act – a commonsense, bipartisan piece of legislation that would create a fair timeframe to comply with new rules. I hope that Congress will address these regulations, and take up the Fair Compliance Act as soon as possible, to prevent the potential loss of a million jobs, increased utility rates, and more damage to our economy."

W.Va. developing incentive plan to attract ethane cracker

Posted: Dec 21, 2011 11:38 AM EST Updated: Dec 21, 2011 11:47 AM EST

By Jim Ross

West Virginia could be about to up its bet in the game to win a $2 billion ethane cracker plant.

Keith Burdette, West Virginia secretary of commerce and head of the West Virginia Development Office, says he may ask the Legislature to consider an incentive plan that would nearly eliminate personal property taxes on crackers and related developments that involve an investment of $2 billion or more.

Existing law allows the state to reduce the personal property tax rate to 5 percent for a maximum of 10 years. Burdette says he may ask the Legislature to extend that cut to 25 years.

Incentives come into play because West Virginia is trying to land one or perhaps two ethane crackers to take advantage of development of Marcellus shale gas fields. At least three companies — Shell Chemicals, Dow Chemical Co. and Brazil-based Braskem SA — have been named in news reports as having interest in building new cracker plants in the United States.

Shell has said it wants to announce its preferred site for a cracker in the Appalachian region by the end of January. Shell has also said its January announcement will not be the final decision on where it wants to build its cracker. Burdette said a second company that's looking at West Virginia will not announce its preferred site until it is further along in its due diligence.

Bayer is offering property it owns in Kanawha and Marshall counties as sites for one or two crackers.

Ohio is offering a $1.4 billion incentive package to land a cracker.

"We think we can create a package that's competitive with any place," Burdette said this week.

A cracker takes ethane, a byproduct of drilling for gas, breaks it down and reassembles the elements into products that are used in plastics industries.

A cracker could mean thousands of construction jobs and hundreds of permanent jobs.

According to Greenwire, a national energy and environmental news service, ethane is harder to move around than natural gas itself, also known as methane. Thus, ethane is usually cracked close to the wells that produce it.

Burdette said he could not provide an estimate on how much his proposed incentive package would save an ethane producer, as personal property tax rates vary from county to county. But he did say he thinks incentives are only one part of the state's attractiveness to Shell and other companies.

"It's not all about incentives. It's about sites. It's about infrastructure. It's about work force. It's about the expandability of the site itself. The incentive piece is the icing on the cake" he said.

Planned Pipeline Would Fuel Power Stations From Shale

December 22, 2011

By CASEY JUNKINS Staff Writer , The Intelligencer / Wheeling News-Register

CLARINGTON - Natural gas from the Utica and Marcellus shale formations may fire some American Electric Power plants across eastern Ohio, via a new pipeline network.

"One of the areas of fastest growing demand is natural gas-fired power generation, as facilities either switch to cleaner-burning natural gas or are built to run on it," said Wendy K. Olson, spokeswoman for Spectra Energy Corp., the Houston, Texas-based pipeline developer.

Spectra announced its intention to build the new pipeline - capable of transporting 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas each day - Wednesday. At the same time, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its report that will likely lead to the closure of many coal-fired power plants across the county, including AEP's Kammer Plant in Marshall County. AEP serves much of the Upper Ohio Valley, except Hancock, Brooke, Wetzel and Tyler counties.

Natural gas "is 45 percent cleaner than coal and 30 percent cleaner than fuel oil. It's efficient and reliable. And now with the abundance of supply being brought online thanks to developing shale plays, it's now more affordable than ever," added Olson.

Olson said the proposed pipeline would originate in Carroll County, Ohio, which lies to the north of Cadiz in Harrison County and west of East Liverpool in Columbiana County. This north-south running line would wind through Harrison and Belmont counties, before intersecting with the east-west running Texas Eastern pipeline near Clarington.

The pipeline will only be built if Spectra receives additional supply commitments, but Olson said the line's projected in-service date is November 2014.

"As environmental demands increase for cleaner power generation, natural gas is a fuel of choice to meet these needs - and it's a domestically abundant resource that helps increase our energy independence and bring jobs and revenue to our local communities," she added.

AEP spokeswoman Melissa McHenry said her company committed to use about 10 percent of the pipeline's supply capacity, which would equal roughly 100 million cubic feet of gas per day. She said the gas would travel to the company's power plants that already run on natural gas. These AEP plants include:

McHenry emphasized the planned pipeline is still in its very early stages, but said AEP is optimistic about the possibilities.

Bill Yardley, group vice president of Spectra Energy Transmission, Northeast, is upbeat about the project.

"At a time when there is growing environmental need for cleaner power generation, this new infrastructure will deliver clean, affordable and much-needed energy to Ohio, the Midwest and South," he said.

Chesapeake Energy, which holds about 1.5 million net acres in the Utica play, is pursuing capacity on the Spectra pipeline as well.

"Chesapeake has made a preliminary agreement to negotiate for the transportation of a yet-to-be-determined volume of natural gas through the pipeline, but will not make a capital investment in the project," said Chesapeake spokesman Pete Kenworthy. "Having access to multiple markets is beneficial for the development of the Utica."

EPA Tells Power Plants To Clean Up Their Acts

New rules on mercury will force many shutdowns

December 22, 2011

By DINA CAPPIELLO Associated Press Writer , The Intelligencer / Wheeling News-Register

WASHINGTON - Clean up or shut down.

That's the decision facing hundreds of the nation's oldest and dirtiest power plants under an Environmental Protection Agency rule announced Wednesday that will force plants to control mercury and other toxic pollutants for the first time.

The long overdue national standards rein in the largest remaining source of uncontrolled toxic pollution in the U.S. - the emissions from the nation's coal- and oil-fired power plants, which have been allowed to run for decades without addressing their full environmental and public health costs.

The impact of the ruling will be greatest in the Midwest and in the coal belt - Kentucky, West Virginia and Virginia - where dozens of units likely will be mothballed, according to an Associated Press survey. The majority of facilities will continue to run, and find ways to reduce pollution.

About half of the 1,200 coal- and oil-fired units nationwide still lack modern pollution controls, despite the EPA in 1990 getting the authority from Congress to control toxic air pollution from power plant smokestacks. A decade later, in 2000, the agency concluded it was necessary to clamp down on the emissions to protect public health.

At a press conference Wednesday at Children's National Medical Center in Washington, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said the regulation was the Obama administration's "biggest clean air action yet", trumping an agreement to double fuel economy standards for vehicles and another rule that will reduce emissions from power plants that foul the air in states downwind.

The administration was under court order to issue a new rule, after a court threw out an attempt by the Bush administration to exempt power plants from toxic air pollution controls.

"Before this rule, there were no national standards limiting the amount of mercury, arsenic, chromium, nickel and acid gases that power plants across the country could release into the air that we breathe," said Jackson, listing the contaminants linked to cancer, IQ loss, heart disease and lung disease that are covered by the rule, and that also pollute lakes, streams and fish.

In a video released Wednesday afternoon, President Barack Obama said the decades of delays caused by special interest groups that resulted in standards never being put into place for power plants "was wrong."

"Today, my administration is saying, 'Enough,'" he said.

When fully implemented in 2016, the standards will slash mercury pollution from burning coal by 90 percent, lung-damaging acid gases by 88 percent and soot-producing sulfur dioxide by 41 percent.

Power plant operators will have to choose between installing pollution control equipment, switching to cleaner-burning natural gas, or shutting down the plant. None of those choices come cheap - the EPA estimates the rule will cost $9.6 billion annually, making it one of the most expensive the agency has ever issued.

Some power producers intensely lobbied the Obama administration to weaken the rule and to delay it, and Republicans in Congress passed legislation to do so, saying it would threaten jobs and the reliability of the power grid, and raise electricity prices.

To ease those concerns, the administration will encourage states to make "broadly available" an additional fourth year to comply with the rule, as allowed by the law. Case-by-case extensions could also be granted to address local reliability issues, according to a presidential memorandum sent Wednesday to Jackson.

In the memorandum, Obama directs the EPA to ensure that implementation of the rule "proceed in a cost-effective manner that ensures electric reliability."

Environmentalists said Wednesday that the added flexibility did not jeopardize the public health benefits of the regulation.

"After more than two decades of delay, dirty coal-fired power plants are going to be cleaned up in short order," said Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, who said the EPA "bent over backwards" to accommodate concerns about reliability.

For those in the industry, and some in Congress, the concessions didn't go far enough.

Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe, the top Republican on the Senate's environment committee, said he would file a joint resolution, a rarely used Congressional tactic, to get the rule overturned.

Some in the industry pushed for an automatic delay, or "safety valve," to make sure that plants that have to run to ensure reliability aren't found in violation of the rule and too many plants don't close down at once.

Park Drilling Cleared

Brooke Hills Board Signs With Chesapeake

December 21, 2011

By WARREN SCOTT , The Intelligencer / Wheeling News-Register

The Brooke Hills Park board, at its regular meeting on Tuesday, entered into an agreement allowing for the park to receive royalties for natural gas drawn from nearly 100 acres there.

Bill Watson, the board's legal counsel, noted the board, formally known as the Brooke County Park and Recreation Commission, had entered into a lease agreement with Chesapeake Appalachia allowing the company to drill for natural gas under park grounds.

But park officials said later they learned mineral rights for much of the property belonged to descendants of the Gist family, who donated the land to the county more than 40 years ago.

That resulted in the park being poised to receive royalties for 22 acres only, though the park commission received a $750,000 signing fee for the lease.

Watson didn't go into detail at Tuesday's meeting but said the situation has changed, and the park can receive royalties on gas drawn from nearly 100 acres as projected originally.

At a Brooke County Commission meeting in September, park officials hinted that mineral rights for the Gists' descendants could expire this year. Watson couldn't be reached for comment following the meeting.

Walter Ferguson, the board's newly elected president - who was called for comment - said specific details about the agreement should be directed to Watson.

But he confirmed crews with Chesapeake have drilled a vertical well at the park and hope to begin a horizontal one soon.

Since September crews have been working in a wooded area at the rear of the park near Pierce Run Road.

They had hoped to access the site from Pierce Run Road. But that would require them to cross the creek, so they have built a road to the park's main road instead, scheduling their hauling around such fall events as the Brooke County Fair and Brooke Hills Spooktacular.

Natural gas drilling involves a controversial process known as hydraulic fracturing. It entails blasting the underground Marcellus shale with water, sand and chemicals, some of them toxic, to release the natural gas.

Gas industry officials say the drilling occurs thousands of feet below water tables and wells are heavily sealed with concrete and steel to prevent the fluid from leaking into the ground.

Opponents point to incidents in which wastewater from the process was spilled outside the wells or methane from abandoned coal mines was released, resulting in fires. Park board members said in January officials with Chesapeake have assured them the park won't be harmed. They noted the lease will be a major source of revenue for the park, which has struggled financially in recent years.

Asked how the board will use the signing fee or royalties paid for the gas tapped there, Ferguson said the board has made plans to hire an architect to aid it in developing a plan for improvements.

He noted replacing the park's aging swimming pool with a water park and adding an ice skating rink are ideas that have been suggested.

Chesapeake also has approached the park commission for an easement allowing it to build an underground transmission line to transport the gas from the site. Ferguson said the board is still negotiating for the easement and construction of the transmission line is still a few years away.

Pittsburgh Tribune Review:

$500 million to expand natural gas shipping

By Bloomberg News

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Spectra Energy Corp. plans to spend about $500 million in Ohio to expand shipping capacity on its Texas Eastern pipeline system to handle rising natural-gas production from the Utica and Marcellus shale formations.

American Electric Power Co. and Chesapeake Energy Corp., the largest holder of Utica Shale leases, signed an agreement to develop 70 miles of new lines, Houston-based Spectra said on Wednesday in a statement. The addition in Ohio will raise shipping capacity by 1 billion cubic feet a day, or about 18 percent, Wendy Olson, a Spectra spokeswoman, said in an e-mail today.

Production from U.S. shale deposits, where water and chemicals are pumped underground at high pressure to break apart dense rock and release gas, more than doubled from 2007 to 2009, according to Energy Department data.

American Electric, the largest U.S. coal burner, is pursuing pipeline capacity for gas-fired power plants, Spectra said. The utility owner, based in Columbus, Ohio, has estimated that tighter U.S. air-pollution restrictions may force it to close some coal-burning plants.

"We do anticipate more than one plant will attach" to the new gas lines, Olson said.

Chesapeake is pursuing additional shipping capacity for its production, Spectra said. The Oklahoma City-based company is the largest oil and gas leaseholder in the Utica shale with 1.4 million net acres.

Spectra rose 1.6 percent to close at $30.50 in New York, the highest since it was spun off by Duke Energy Corp. in January 2007. American Electric shares rose 2.3 percent to $40.85, its highest since July 9, 2008. Chesapeake shares rose to $22.99.

The project is slated to begin operating in November 2014, according to the statement.

----- Original Message -----

From: "Beth Little" <blittle@citynet.net>

To: <blittle@citynet.net>

Sent: Wednesday, December 21, 2011 4:03 PM

Subject: FW: [MarcellusGasInfo] Fracking Is ZERO Tolerance (an unpublished P&S Guest Viewpoint)

Here's a provocative idea from NY. Substitute Tomblin for governor and
think about it.

-----Original Message-----
From: marcellusgasinfo@googlegroups.com
[mailto:marcellusgasinfo@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rich Kellman
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 1:45 PM
To: Subject: [MarcellusGasInfo] Fracking Is ZERO Tolerance (an unpublished P&S
Guest Viewpoint)

This is a paraphrased, modified version of a Guest Viewpoint I sent in but
has not gotten published- I'm not holding my breath.The ideas are the same:

     Many,or all, supporters of fracking contend that it can be, and will
be, done safely. Do these folks have a portal to the future which we
frack-opponents have somehow been unfortunate enough to have missed?
     If Governor Cuomo and his subordinates at the DEC, as well as other
governmental bodies which have a stake in drilling do, in fact, have these
sure fire- precautions nailed down, then why haven't other states where
drilling has been underway been beating down the DEC doors to get this
information? Then they could put an end to at least some of the worst very
well documented disastrous results that the environment, habitat, and humans
have been forced to suffer for much too long.
    Fracking has no room whatsoever for error. Hopefully Mr. Cuomo will also
learn this lesson. If we can imagine the following scenario which might
"illuminate" some of the pressing fracking realities and consequences for
him:
   Mr. Cuomo, as the State leader, should exhibit more leadership by
example. The land, homes and properties surrounding the Governor's mansion
and his private residence(s) would be taken by eminent domain. A 5 acre, or
so ,drill pad would then be constructed by bulldozing ,trenching, and
digging up everything that is in the way of this "technology". Mr.Cuomo
would live in the mansion/residence(s), other than his work time, while all
stages of the drilling process are carried out. He'll be asked to only use
the same health/safety/living precautions that most of the other residents
of New York are able to afford.
At the end of this "experiment", the Governor will then be publicly asked
"What do you think now?"

District gets $628K for drilling lease

12/22/2011 3:33 AM

SAXONBURG (AP) - A Pittsburgh-area school district has finalized a lease agreement with a gas drilling company and received $628,000 up front.

The Valley News Dispatch reported Wednesday that Phillips Exploration's lease with South Butler School District also carries an 18 percent royalty from any gas that is produced and sold from the acreage. Phillips Exploration is owned by Texas-based XTO Energy, which is owned by ExxonMobil.

The newspaper reported that the lease requires district officials to approve the site of any well before Phillips drills, and any well or pipeline must be at least 500 feet from a district structure.

The school board approved the five-year lease with a 6-2 vote in September.

It covers about 165 acres the district owns.

Corner Cupboard receives $16K donation from Consol

12/22/2011 3:33 AM

By Jon Stevens, Staff writer

jstevens@observer-reporter.com

WAYNESBURG - Corner Cupboard Food Bank on Rolling Meadows Road received an early Christmas present Wednesday when Consol Energy presented the organization with an additional $16,000 raised through the employee sale of Pittsburgh Penguin T-shirts.

The employee donation brings Consol Energy's gift to Corner Cupboard to more than $49,175 this holiday season.

To kick off the companywide effort before Thanksgiving, Consol sponsored the fourth annual Corner Cupboard Holiday Food Drive at the Greene County Courthouse Nov. 15. Consol employees and food bank volunteers collected nonperishable food and monetary donations from those who attended as well as from area businesses.

"In addition to the $20,000 we invested in-kind to the food drive event," the $8,175 collected at the event and Consol's $5,000 cash donation, "I am pleased to present an additional $16,000 from Consol's employees," said Laurel Ziemba, director of community relations for Consol.

"Consol's annual contributions allow the Corner Cupboard Food Bank to double our funding to help the community's most vulnerable," said Jan Caldwell, executive director of the food bank. "We are especially grateful during the winter holidays when there is a substantial jump in the number in need of food assistance."

Last year, Consol presented Caldwell with a large envelope containing checks totaling $35,680 from the T-shirt sales, prompting Caldwell to remark, "You guys are just awesome. I am speechless. This is just over the top."

Consol began its holiday food drive in 2008, a year the food bank had to include chicken breasts as a substitute for a turkey in many of its Thanksgiving baskets.

Those who would still like to donate money or food or are interested in volunteering with the food bank may call the food bank at 724-627-9784. Those who would like to send donations may direct them to Corner Cupboard Food Bank, 511 Rolling Meadows Road, Waynesburg, PA 15370.