Kalla objects to Jasper Air Quality Permit for Jasper Power Plant
A member of Healthy Dubois County, Inc., has filed an objection to the application for a renewal of the air permit for the Jasper Power Plant.
Once a permit has been filed with IDEM, notification is sent to local media sources and filed with the library. The public has 30 days to file objections to the application. Alec Kalla, a writer and activist from French Lick, filed objections to the air permit process after the Jasper Electric Utility filed for a renewal. He is requesting a public hearing be conducted by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM) to hear objections to the issuance of Jasper Municipal Power’s air permit.
Kalla is a founding member of the group Healthy Dubois County, Inc., which is currently protesting the conversion of the coal-fired power plant to a biomass fueled power plant.
Kalla’s objections are based on the the coal fire that occurred late last year, emissions of the power plant as it currently operates and he even contests that the boiler has been modified due to repairs that occurred to the boiler after a 1997 law that limited emissions from coal fired plants was passed.
Those emissions were capped at under 10-tons per year but due to the age of the boiler at the Jasper Power Plant, they were not regulated by the new standards. Kalla stated repairs listed in the city’s application are actually replacement parts and therefore should be considered upgrades to the boiler.
Kalla cites in his letter to Mohammed Muhammad D. Khan with the IDEM Office of Air Quality reports from a Black & Veatch study conducted in 2010, “. . . the efficiency of the boiler has been lessened because of wear of the grate which hinders proper airflow and because several tubes have failed requiring installation of plugs in the headers and because the generating bank has buildup.”
He contends that since these failures and subsequent repairs are modifications to the boiler it should be regulated by the current restrictions, rather than allowed to operate under the less strict emission standards.
“My objections are based upon flaws, inconsistencies and inaccuracies in the draft permit and application, and upon items missing from them,” Kalla stated in an e-mail. “Endangerment of human health by the plant’s emissions are another concern forming a basis of my objections. Also, I argue in my objections that the plant has been modified from its original condition and so emissions will be changed.”
According to IDEM’s Mohammed Khan, IDEM is reviewing Kalla’s objections at this time and will notify the public if a hearing is set.
City Utilities Manager Bud Hauersperger was unavailable for comment at the time of this report. The city’s current air permit is valid until later in 2013.
