Guest View: Scrap Biomass for 'Clean' Energy

Thursday, July 12, 2007
By Dan Embree

    When New Mexico Environment Secretary Ron Curry denied the air quality permit for a projected biomass power plant near Estancia, he probably ended a controversy that had been hovering smokily over Torrance County for six months.

    David Cohen, president of Western Water and Power, was quoted by the Albuquerque Journal as conceding that the denial was a "serious setback" that left WWP uncertain about proceeding with plans to build a plant that would produce power from burning trees.

    The plan had been vigorously opposed by the Forest Guardians and a loosely organized group of Torrance County citizens on the grounds that, contrary to WWP's claims, the plant wasn't really clean, wouldn't really use renewable fuel, wouldn't really preserve the 43,000 acres of state land from which the trees were to be removed and wouldn't really benefit the residents of the county.

    These opponents appear to have prevailed through a series of meetings with state officials, including Gov. Richardson's Energy and Environment Policy Advisor, Sarah Cottrell, (state) Rep. Rhonda King and Secretary Curry himself. Curry's decision cited the excessive use of natural gas to burn the wood as a source of sulfur dioxide— a point the Torrance County irregulars had repeatedly made.

    Now that the dust has settled, it would be wise to consider what the controversy has taught us:

    The New Mexico Renewable Energy Act of 2004 should be amended to remove biomass from the list of clean, renewable energy sources— a list that properly includes solar, wind and geothermal energy.

    According to the Act, "renewable energy means energy generated by the use of zero- or low-emissions technology," but biomass (essentially wood burning) produces not only sulfur dioxide, but carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, various volatile organic compounds and particulate matter in sizes small enough to breathe in and too small to breathe out. The projected plant would have poured more than 700 tons of various pollutants into the air of Torrance County— about as much as a relatively clean coal-fired plant.

    And as for the renewability, WWP planned to burn piñon trees— trees that, according to the Forest Service, take 50 to 200 years to reach maturity.

    Without the tax breaks that the Renewable Energy Act made possible, the biomass plant would never have been considered.

    The state needs a comprehensive procedure for reviewing future proposals in a fair and public way. The various parts of this project made their way through the state's approval process quietly, not to say stealthily, without ever being considered as a whole in a public forum. For example:
   

The State Land Office virtually gave away a lease on 43,000 acres of state land without conducting a study of the impact of the massive tree removal on the area's wildlife or on its estimated 800 archeological sites. WWP was the only bidder allowed.
   

The Air Quality Bureau considered the quality of the air only within the boundaries of the plant itself. The occurrence of acid rain on fields or the breathing of pollutants by residents a mile away were not within their authority, officials said.
   

The County Commissioners approved a resolution in favor of the project a month before the Air Quality Bureau's hearings showed that emissions would be much greater than those WWP had given the Commissioners.
   

At this writing, the Ground Water Quality Bureau has not yet determined how to classify the tons of ash that the plant would produce, but, according to an official I talked to, it is leaning toward requiring transportation by special haulers to specially licensed landfills— this, despite WWP's assurances to the county that the ash presented no problem.

    As a result of this fragmented and largely behind-the scenes process, when citizens raised concerns about a variety of issues— 18-wheelers making hourly deliveries of fuel on county roads, probable incursions into national forests to the exclusion of local wood-cutters, the give-away of tax revenues that might have been expected from a $94 million plant, the ripping of roads across the Chupadera Mesa, the lack of experience of WWP in the biomass business— they were repeatedly told that they were too late or in the wrong forum.

    Companies, like WWP, who want huge tax breaks from the state, must be compelled to reveal their plans completely and publicly. One of the biggest mysteries of the projected biomass plant was where the fuel (55 tons an hour, 24 hours a day, for 20 years) was going to come from. WWP's eight-page "Project Plan," presented to the Torrance County Commission, estimated that 25 percent of its fuel needs would be met by the "renewable" (but strangely, not replanted) piñon and juniper trees of the Chupadera Mesa. The other three-quarters were to come from "contracts that are currently being negotiated" from sources vaguely including "East Mountain forest thinning," which sounds a lot like the national forest.

    But the U.S. Forest Service doesn't always roll over as easily as the State Land Office. So before the county issues millions in bonds and the state grants millions in tax breaks, shouldn't we all know that the fuel is under contract?

    When Secretary Curry met with a large and vociferous group of Torrance County citizens in Moriarty, he seemed to understand many of these points. He talked about his and Gov. Richardson's commitment to "environmental justice" (which means, I gather, not sticking dirty projects in poor and rural places) and "coordinating business plans and environmental plans" (which means, I think, explaining what you're really up to). Good for Secretary Curry, and good for the man who appointed him, Gov. Richardson.

    Now let's get to work on a cleaner process for ensuring a cleaner environment.
    Dan Embree is a resident of Mountainair.