New Jersey Asks to Join U.S. in GenOn Energy Emissions Fight
February 08, 2012, 11:02 AM ESTBy Sophia Pearson
(Updates with pollution data in fourth paragraph)
Feb. 6 (Bloomberg) -- New Jersey asked to intervene in a legal fight between GenOn Energy Inc. and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to force a cut in power plant emissions that the state said are harming its air quality.
The EPA last year granted a request by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to force GenOn to cut emissions at a plant in Portland, Pennsylvania, 60 percent by 2013 and by at least 81 percent in three years. GenOn appealed to a federal court in Philadelphia, where New Jersey today filed a motion to intervene, according to a statement from the state agency.
“The amount of emissions coming from the Portland plant is staggering,” Commissioner Bob Martin of the state environmental department said in the statement. “The continuing negative effects on public health cannot be tolerated. We intend to press the courts to force GenOn to meet Clean Air Act requirements.”
The Portland plant in 2010 emitted more than 30,000 tons of sulfur dioxide plus mercury and other contaminants into the air across the Delaware River from New Jersey, affecting residents in Warren, Morris, Sussex and Hunterdon counties, according to the statement.
New Jersey’s request to the EPA is part of the Christie administration’s effort to reduce air pollution by targeting out-of-state power plants. The state has joined New York, Connecticut, Maryland, Pennsylvania and the U.S. government in lawsuits against an Edison International subsidiary and subsidiaries of First Energy Corp. to reduce emissions at power plants.
Laurie Fickman, a spokeswoman for Houston-based GenOn, didn’t immediately return a call for comment on the state’s action.
--With assistance from Steven Church in Wilmington. Editors: Charles Carter, Andrew Dunn
To contact the reporter on this story: Sophia Pearson in Wilmington, Delaware, at spearson3@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Hytha at mhytha@bloomberg.net
