Letter: Riverview president raises suspicions about coal to diesel

Greg Merle, President of Riverview Energy coal-to-diesel refinery, stated in his recent letter to the editor that opponents are “ignorant” and “uninformed” about his proposal to build a massive, polluting facility in the newly annexed city limits of Dale and within a mile of David Turnham elementary school and two nursing homes.

We are suspicious of Mr. Merle for calling the following people ignorant: local scientists, family doctors, pediatricians, farmers, teachers, students, members of the clergy, and others who live here.

We have read his own air quality permit and base our well-founded concerns upon the information in it. Those he calls ignorant are doing our due diligence, reading his permit, learning the permit’s contents, and hosting subsequent area forums led by doctors, engineers, farmers, etc.

We are suspicious because the “propaganda” (his word) he accuses us of spreading is material quoted verbatim from his own air quality permit application.

We are suspicious because he and Tom Utter, Executive Director of Lincolnland Economic Development Corporation, have not provided citizens with any forum where our concerns could be addressed, despite our being told early in 2018 that such forums would be offered.

We are concerned because of the effects on all area towns downwind from his proposed behemoth and its hazardous fallout, and all who will also receive the brunt of the inescapable rotten egg stench from the large volumes of sulfur his refinery will produce. This stench has not been refuted by Mr. Merle or IDEM. The only unknown is how strong the odor will be and how often it will affect our communities. He expects us to live with it.

Mr. Merle’s home is in Connecticut, over 700 miles away. 

We are suspicious because his company was formerly known as Clean Coal Refining Corporation and now is titled the more palatable Riverview Energy, a common practice in the polluting industries to sugarcoat the brand to distract the public from the hazardous materials emitted upon unsuspecting communities.

We are suspicious because he spent six years in Indiana’s Vermillion County trying to build a coal-to-diesel refinery there and couldn’t make it happen at the site of a World War II chemical warfare (nerve gas) plant, and now he wants to build a World War II-era facility here in our beautiful, rural area that relies heavily on tourism and farming for our local economies.

We are suspicious because Mr. Merle has not, to our knowledge, publicly shared any information about his work history and business experience. He wants to do business here without sharing a detailed resume or curriculum vitae. We know of no job, let alone one where the stakes for citizens’ quality of life are so high, where one would be hired without this information being made public.

We are suspicious because he wants us to blindly trust him to build the first C2D refinery in the entire western hemisphere—not only near a school and nursing homes, but also an amusement park, a state park and amphitheatre, a national memorial park, a historic monastery and abbey, a national and state forest, etc. He expresses his desire to build additional refineries in our immediate area and create a rapidly expanding industrial zone. To us, such a shift without greater pause and more public input dishonors our region’s character and unique history.

We are concerned because many schools in close proximity to his proposed refinery already have special education rates twice the national average. Unexplained high infant mortality spikes in some areas are a cause for concern as are MS rates. Adding any additional toxins into local pregnant mothers’ air will not help to ensure their children will be born without permanent harm.

We are concerned about the economics and the environmental effects of making a liquid out of a solid. This experimental C2D technology is not worth the risk especially when the cost of oil is relatively low. Creating fuel from a liquid rather than from a solid is safer, simpler, and more cost effective. The short and long-term soil, air, and water contamination (and subsequent effects on public health) derived from a solid-source conversion facility so close to citizens puts our already sensitive eco-system at greater risk. 

We are suspicious because, according to his own air permit, Mr. Merle’s refinery will annually emit 2.2 million tons of the greenhouse gas CO2 and hundreds of tons of other carcinogenic material, cardio-vascular disruptors, etc., including benzene, hexane, nickel, formaldehyde, methanol, ammonia, H2S, xylenes, phenol, and more. The CO2 emissions alone are a nonstarter when other US cities and states and countries around the world are reducing their emissions to reduce the projected catastrophic effects of climate change. In Indiana, Mr. Merle and current elected officials ignore well-established science to the detriment of our future.

We are concerned because, under IDEM’s authority, Indiana consistently ranks at or near 50th in the US in air pollution and first in the US in toxic emissions per square mile. It is no wonder: IDEM routinely rubber stamps massive polluters and unbelievably does not welcome and consult medical professionals to determine the effects of toxins on human tissue. The view that IDEM will protect us is naive and ill-informed. Under IDEM’s watch and lax monitoring, Spencer County already ranks 23rd out of 3,142 counties in the nation in toxic emissions, according to the EPA. To add more burden to this region is unconscionable, but we fully expect IDEM, under Governor Holcomb’s directive, will continue their unfortunate pattern and approve Mr. Merle’s harmful air permit later this year. Incidentally, Governor Holcomb so far has not met with concerned citizens and doctors, after repeated requests.

We are concerned that IDEM states that Riverview would have “no significant impact” on public health and environment (Oct. 29, 2018) when according to emissions data in Mr. Merle’s air quality permit application, his refinery would add greenhouse gases equivalent to one-fifth of the passenger cars in the entire state of Indiana. We are suspicious that IDEM does not provide adequate air quality monitoring in rural areas where they approve the giant polluters.

We understand that industry creates some pollution but are concerned that Mr. Merle’s promise of 225 permanent positions carries too heavy a health and environmental burden. As researched by one of our members, Riverview will emit over 10,000 tons of pollution per employee per year. In comparison, Waupaca annually emits 670 tons per employee, MasterBrand, 6.6 tons per employee annually, and Toyota 1.4 tons per employee annually. 

We are concerned when local and state elected officials who have publicly approved Mr. Merle’s proposal repeatedly cannot answer basic questions from concerned citizens about the air permit. Sadly our current officials approving of this ill-conceived plan are less informed than many local citizens who have read the air permit draft in depth. One recently said on camera, “I don’t know anything about it, but I’m for it.”

A Spencer County commissioner had no idea how much CO2 would be released annually.

We are suspicious because in his letter, Mr. Merle mentioned one person who spoke “vociferously” in favor of his refinery at the Dec. 5, 2018, IDEM public hearing at Heritage Hills. This one of only seven speaking favorably did not address the reason for the hearing—air quality.

Mr. Merle does not acknowledge the 47 well-informed citizens who spoke in opposition to his proposal and did address air quality. These included medical doctors, the executive director of the Indiana Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, a chemist, a chemical engineer, an ethicist from USI, farmers, parents, students, a former state senator, a union leader, and others who live in the area and love their homes—and none of whom were financially motivated to speak. We are suspicious because Mr. Merle did not attend the hearing.

His misrepresentation of the display of support is disappointing.   

The overall ratio of those opposed to this refinery—in the numbers of letters to the editor, lawn signs, public forums, 47 opposed speakers to only 7 in favor at the IDEM hearing, and nonconfrontational, door-to-door inquiries—dwarfs those who believe this and proposed additional refineries are a positive direction for our communities and our world at this time in history. Especially when our unemployment rates are among the lowest in the nation, and 50-year old companies like Thermwood state they will have to relocate to Tennessee if this plant gets built because of an existing shortage of workers here, we don’t need this refinery.

We need government officials who are willing to put the health and well-being of our region’s citizens ahead of potential financial gain for a few. Southwestern Indiana deserves safer economic development vs. being the perennial “sacrifice zone”. (See www.superpolluters.com.)

We encourage citizens to become informed and to get involved. Since such huge decisions by a few will affect the quality of life for us all, we all have the right to ask questions, to study air permits, to speak with our families, friends, and neighbors, and to respectfully address our elected officials.

We hope our leaders will soon listen and promote forward-thinking, sustainable, and more unifying ideas.

—Rock Emmert and Kris Lasher, Ferdinand Southwestern Indiana Citizens for Quality of Life, www.noc2d.com