Sierra Club sues to force cleanup at Four Corners Power Plant

Anne Greenberg
Navajo Times
August 3, 2006

WINDOW ROCK – The New Mexico Sierra Club made an unexpected move in a long ignored battle when it filed suit last week to force the cleanup of emissions from the Four Corners Power Plant.

The July 27 suit names the federal Environmental Protection Agency as defendant, but the suit also involves the Navajo Nation's failure to crack down on air pollution from the power plant.

The Navajo Nation recently was grated primary enforcement authority by the EPA, but only after foreswearing its right to sue industrial polluters. Instead, the Navajo EPA pledged to work cooperatively to ensure compliance.

The battle over the Four Corners generating station, which has been gong on for more than seven years, concerns the plant's failure to comply with the federal Clean Air Act and the regulators' failure to issue regulations compelling it to comply.

The plant is operated by Arizona Public Service Company, majority owner in a consortium of utilities.

Now that the Mohave Generating Station in Laughlin, Nev., has closed, Four Corners is the dirtiest power plant in the Southwest.

According to the Sierra Club's complaint, the EPA failed to provide the Navajo Nation with a federal plan that would allow the tribe to regulate plant emissions, even though the federal agency had declared it "both necessary and appropriate" to insure such a plan in 1999.

Robert Tohe, an environmental justice organizer with the Sierra Club, stressed that the purpose of the lawsuit is simply to motivate the EPA to start regulating the power plant.

"Our intent is not to shut down the power plant, cause the loss of revenue or loss of jobs, Tohe said. "Our primary goal is to get these regulations into place and see the process sped up for the health and safety of the people in the Four Corners area."

The Four Corners plant emits 40,742 tons of nitrogen oxide each year - the largest amount of any coal-fired generating plant in the country.

It emits 590 pounds of mercury into the air as well.

Plant emissions contribute to the wintertime brown cloud that often cloaks the San Juan River valley, and spurred citizen opposition to plans to build a third plant, the Desert Rock Power Plant, nearby.

In 1999, the EPA ordered the plant to come up with an emissions reduction plan, saying it was necessary in order to "protect air quality on the Navajo Reservation."

But the plan was never finalized, so it never gained the force of law.

In June 2001, the EPA imposed partial pollution limits on the plant, but address acid rain prevention (caused by sulfur dioxide emissions). Other harmful emissions continued.

In July 2005, the Sierra Club formally asked the EPA to issue an order to limit the other pollutants, but says it received no response.

"Ten years ago, under the Clinton administration, the EPA implemented federal laws that would reduce emissions of the power plant," said Andy Bessler, Southwest representative for the Sierra Club. "But under the Bush administration, they dropped the ball."

After meeting with attorneys Steven Sugarman and Reed Zars, the Sierra Club informed the EPA in late November of its intent to sue.

By July 27, over 180 days had passed and still the agency has not issued a final cleanup plan for the plant, so the environmentalists filed suit.

Zars said its about time the EPA follows through on the commitment made seven years ago.

"This power plant, like all others, needs a speed limit," Zars said. "Under the Clean Air Act, the obligation to issue regulations falls on the EPA, and they have yet to deliver."