Old Dominion Electric Cooperative is proposing to build a 1500 Megawatt coal-fired electric plant in the tiny town of Dendron, Virginia. It will be the second largest in Virginia. It will emit nearly 15 million tons of CO2 each year contributing to Virginia’s increasing greenhouse gas emissions. Maybe even more frightening is the 118 pounds of mercury that will be released each year in a location just 15 miles from the Chesapeake Bay watershed. You can learn more about this project at the Sierra Club Web site. In interest of fairness, ODEC has their own Web site related to the project.
While ODEC will tell you that this plant is “clean,” that doesn’t mean that they have completely eliminated envinronmental threats, far from it. I think the scariest piece are the piles of fly ash that accumulate, over 16 stories high. In nearby Yorktown, Virginia, attempts to bury the ash led to contaminated ground water. According to an EPA report: “Vanadium, nickel, selenium, and sulfate have been found in groundwater near the four fly ash pits. Surface water in Chisman Creek was shown to be contaminated with vanadium, nickel, and sulfate. Drinking contaminated groundwater posed a risk to the public.” Luckily for the folks in Yorktown, they could tap into the city water supply. I doubt if the Dendron residents have that option.
I wrote a letter to the Dendron city council this morning that I will share here. I would encourage you to do the same, especially if you, like me, live within the 30-mile radius that has been identified as the “zone of concern” by health experts. We need to make it so hard for companies like ODEC to build old technologies that their only option is to start looking into alternatives. Surely in a rural community, biomass makes some kind of sense. ODEC could be on the forefront of the movement towards cleaner alternatives but has chosen instead to prey on a small community in the hopes of not meeting much opposition as they continue practices for which the health dangers have been known for decades.
Here’s the letter:
Dendron City Council
c/o The Town of Dendron
2855 Rolfe Highway
Dendron, Virginia 23839Dear Honorable City Council Members:
I am writing to ask that you deny Old Dominion Electric Cooperative’s application to build a coal-fired electric plant in your town. While I understand that it is hard to turn down jobs and money, I believe they are small compensation for the environmental and community disasters that will occur if this goes forward.
My husband and I visit Surry often. We pass through Dendron on our way to pick blueberries at Drewry Farms. It is a lovely community. I have trouble imagining where 2,000 workers would even stay. And, I certainly can’t imagine the huge piles of fly ash that will loom over the homes.
I have also worked with the Surry County schools, and I’m concerned that this plant would be within 20 miles of the school campus. I’ll simply remind you that coal-fired electric plants are one of the nation’s largest sources of air pollutants that damage cardiovascular and respiratory health and threaten healthy childhood development.
I’m sure ODEC has painted a rosy economic scenario and said little about negative environmental and community impacts. As a neighbor who is also within the 30-mile radius of the plant, I ask you to consider the other side and tell ODEC that you wish to preserve your community and the environment.
