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The Cleveland Plain Dealer
www.cleveland.com

1,920 Ohio deaths linked to utility air

Tuesday, October 17, 2000
By SABRINA EATON

Air pollution from electric power plants kills more than 30,000 Americans each year, nearly double the number who die from drunken driving accidents or homicides, according to a study to be released today by a coalition of environmental groups.

The study rates Ohio second in the nation in yearly deaths from respiratory problems attributed to coal-burning power plants, with 1,920. Top-ranked Pennsylvania had 2,250.

Cleveland ranked 11th among metropolitan areas in the number of deaths, with 442.

The report performed by a consultant who works regularly for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated that more than 18,000 deaths around the country could be prevented each year if power plants lower nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide output by 75 percent, as pending federal legislation proposes.

"This is not just an issue of pollution blowing into the East coast. Power plant pollution is having a devastating effect on public health right here in Ohio and the Cleveland area," said Margaux Shields, of Ohio Public Interest Research Group, one of the groups that commissioned the report entitled "Death, Disease & Dirty Power."

Electricity producers criticized the new study for relying on prior reports they believe overstate the dangers of plant emissions. Pat Hemlepp of Columbus-based American Electric Power said a recent study by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) found airborne sulfur compounds didn’t harm health, although it linked other forms of air pollution with cardiovascular disease.

A spokesman for Edison Electric Institute, a power company trade group, said the nation’s electric plants take ample environmental precautions, and reduced their annual sooty particle emissions, from 1.8 million tons in 1970 to 0.3 million tons in 1997. Spokesman Dan Reidinger said there’s no proof that power plants, rather than cars, caused the health problems cited in the study.

"There is no guarantee that further ratcheting down power plant emissions is going to produce the kind of health benefits alleged in this report because you can’t say the particles they are talking about came from power plants," Reidinger said. "We don’t want to dismiss this as an area of scientific study or as a concern, but electric utilities take their obligation to safeguard public health very seriously."

Since 1990, Akron-based FirstEnergy Corp. has reduced its emissions of nitrous oxide by 60 percent, sulfur dioxide by 50 percent, and carbon dioxide by 25 percent, said spokesman Ralph DiNicola.

"It is one thing to stand on the sidelines and bark about what the problem is, and a totally different responsibility to produce reliable, affordable electricity in an environmentally responsible manner," DiNicola said. "While these people would like to grow food in their back yards, and pedal bicycles to power medical diagnostic equipment, that is not what the rest of the world wants to do."

Members of the environmental groups that commissioned the report said the EPRI study the utilities cite is inadequate because it examines a year of data from a single city, Atlanta, instead of investigations in dozens of cities over longer periods of time.

They said they reached their conclusions in the new study by linking emissions data from the nation’s power plants with past studies that correlated pollution levels to sickness and death rates.

American Lung Association Vice President Ron White called the environmental groups’ analysis "state of the art," and said electric utilities’ objections were a "smokescreen" effort to hide their major pollution role.

He said small children and the elderly are particularly vulnerable to the type of pollution discussed in the report, as is anyone who suffers from asthma, chronic emphysema and bronchitis.

Clear the Air coalition campaign director Angela Ledford said living within 50 to 100 miles of an older, coal powered plant increases the likelihood of asthma attacks and other illnesses.

"This pollution is shortening the lives of everyone," Ledford said.

 

 


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