Settlement Calls For Overhaul Of Centralia Power Plant

Owners of the Centralia Power Station, considered the second-dirtiest coal-fired plant west of the Mississippi, have agreed to an overhaul that would cut polluting emissions by 90 percent in 10 years.

The negotiated settlement helps to ensure the survival of the plant, the largest employer in Lewis County.

The agreement also calls for $60 million to $75 million in tax breaks for the plant, which has a consortium of owners, including Portland-based PacifiCorp, Spokane’s Washington Water Power Co., Seattle City Light and six other utilities.

The power plant, eight miles east of Centralia, can spew up to 100,000 tons of sulfur dioxide a year, but recently the number has been closer to 70,000 tons. The gas is the primary source of the smog that regularly obscures Mount Rainier.

Under the plan worked out by government regulators and the plant’s owners, sulfur emissions would drop to less than 10,000 tons a year by 2007.

The $280 million plan calls for the installation of two state-of-the-art limestone scrubbers, powerful devices to clean the coal of harmful residue. The first scrubber would be installed by the end of 2001 and would reduce emissions to 30,000 tons; the second would be installed by the end of 2006.

WWP’s share of the costs would be about $35 million, said George Perks, the Spokane company’s superintendent for thermal operations.

WWP takes about 200 megawatts of power from the plant, which was completed in 1972.

Perks said Centralia was built with precipitators that strip particulates from its emissions, but do nothing to control sulphur dioxide.

The plant does not violate federal air standards now, he said, but will when stiffer guidelines take effect in 2001.

“We’re scrambling to comply with the new regulations,” Perks said.

He praised the cooperative effort that led to Monday’s announcement.

“I might have had a hard time saying this four or five months ago, but I think we’re on the edge of making this happen,” Mount Rainier National Park Superintendent William Briggle agreed.

With the plan in place, he said, “we’ll be able to improve the visibility of that splendid mountain we know as Mount Rainier.”

But some conservationists called the arrangement “environmental blackmail.”

“Either we give them a tax break and get some controls, or we don’t get anything,” said Nina Bell, director of Northwest Environmental Advocates of Portland, which has sued in U.S. District Court seeking a reduction of pollutants from the plant.

Among the proposed tax breaks are exemptions from sales and property taxes for pollution-control improvements at the plant and from coal-extraction taxes.

The plant provides 1,340 megawatts of power, enough to light the city of Seattle, as well as 700 mostly well-paying jobs.

The cleanup package requires approval of the Southwest Air Pollution Control Authority, which more than a year ago called for a 50 percent reduction in pollution by PacifiCorp, the plant’s managing owner.

It also requires approval of tax incentives by the state Legislature.

, DataTimes