The Canary Coalition a grassroots clean air movement

The Canary Coalition

a grassroots clean air movement

News and Action

January 5, 2007

- Push is on for 2007 Legislative Agenda

- Energy Future Resolution to be Presented to Legislators on Jan. 8

- Tell Your Utility Company to Stop New Power Plant Construction

- Public Hearings Set on Duke's Cliffside Power Plant Expansion

- Energy at the Crossroads Tour Ploughs Ahead

- Unitarian Universalist Congregation awards grant to Canary Coalition

- Canary Coalition Membership Reaches 1000 and Growing Fast

- Grand Opening Party at New Office, February 2

- Membership Renewal Reminder

Push is on for 2007 Legislative Agenda

Energy is at the top of everyone's agenda in this year's legislative session and the crossroads is crystalizing rapidly. As the population grows and the dynamics of air pollution and climate change become more apparent there are clear choices that have to be made in plans to meet future energy demand.

The power industry intends to build a new generation, hundreds of new nuclear, coal and fossil fuel-burning power plants, projecting growth in energy demand based on the assumption that Americans will continue to use energy at the same or greater per capita levels as in the past. This projection and the resulting proposed course of action, ignores health and environmental consequences in favor of business-as-usual energy use and traditional assumptions related to the financial benefits of growth in industry and commerce.

The Canary Coalition sees a different model for meeting future energy demand that recognizes the health and environmental imperatives. This model involves dramatically lower future per capita energy use and the employment of safe, reliable, renewable resources to produce the energy we'll need. Our plan calls for deep economic incentives to be put in place driving electrical consumers toward conservation and investment in energy efficient light bulbs, household appliances and industrial equipment. There is no need to build and operate additional conventional polluting power plants. The vast investment required to build these plants can be used much more effectively and to the economic benefit of everybody by being directed instead toward investment in efficient equipment, energy education and renewable technology research, development and marketing. This is the basis for our legislative agenda in 2007. In order to move this legislative agenda we'll need to inspire massive public support. So, all Canary Coalition members will be asked to do their part in helping to develop this public support that will allow our voices to be heard in state capitols and in Washington, DC. this year. We all need to start talking about it, writing letters to the editor, informing our state and federal legislators that we want their support. Here is the 2007 legislative agenda. Please read it and pass it on.

Here is contact information for members of the NC House and Senate

Energy Future Resolution to be Presented to Legislators on Jan. 8

On Monday, January 8, 11am, in front of the office of Quality Forward, 29 Page Avenue, in Asheville, there will be a press conference at which the NC Energy Future Resolution will be presented to Representative Susan Fisher (other members of the NC General Assembly have also been invited). The Canary Coalition, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Southern Energy and Environment Expo, and more than 20 community organizations in western North Carolina will deliver more than 3000 signatures of community leaders and citizens who strongly support the proposed legislation.

The NC Energy Future Resolution demands an evaluation by the State of the "least-cost" method of meeting future energy demand, taking into account the real costs resulting from health and environmental impact of all options. Nuclear power, coal and other fossil fuel technologies will be compared to energy efficiency, conservation and various forms of renewable energy technologies in the evaluation. The resolution calls for a mandate that no permits be issued for new power plant construction in North Carolina unless the operation of the plant is consistent with the findings of the least-cost evaluation.

"Almost invariably when we are given cost comparisons between conventional power generation such as nuclear and coal with wind, solar, biogas and other renewable technologies, the cost of health and environmental impact are ignored by the power industry and public officials," explains Avram Friedman of the Canary Coalition.
"But, these costs are real to all members of the public, the same people constituting the ratepayers base in this state. Far more costly than most families' monthly power bill are their medical insurance premiums or direct medical bills that have soared in recent years due largely to the epidemic of asthma, emphysema, other lung and heart disease resulting from the emission of air pollutants from coal-burning power plants and nuclear fuel processing which also involves massive fossil fuel burning and greenhouse gas production. Burning coal and fossil fuels also involves costs in crop losses due to acid rain and excess nitrogen deposition, damage to forests and wildlife, mercury accumulation in aquatic wildlife and loss in tourism and commerce due to heavy particulate haze in the mountains that obscures visibility of long-distance scenic vistas. All of these impacts have real costs that should be included in any least-cost evaluation of energy options."

"We pay some of the costs of nuclear waste on our electric bill -- but there are a lot of costs that are hidden, ignored and will be born by us as tax payers and victims. The nation's high-level nuclear waste is still sitting at the power plants that made it, but a new federal plan to take this waste to a storage site and then for processing in South Carolina will bring this most deadly of waste on trains and trucks INTO our region, with a high percentage traveling through North Carolina," said Mary Olson, Director of the Southeast Office of Nuclear Information and Resource Service. "The plan to take this waste to Nevada has failed, and for good reasons. Now bad reasons (processing the waste makes it worse) are going to bring it here. The true costs of nuclear waste transport have never been factored into nuclear power, and now Duke and Progress both plan to build new reactors in our state," concluded Olson.

The Energy Future Resolution was adopted by many organizations, including the NC State Democratic Party, in 2006, and introduced in both houses of the General Assembly, although it failed to get out of committee in last year's session. Promoters are working to have it reintroduced in the 2007 session while urging strong and vocal public support to help move it through the legislative process.

For more information visit:
www.canarycoalition.org
www.nirs.org
www.energyatthecrossroadstour.org
www.energyatthecrossroadstour.org/Resolve.htm

Tell your Utility Company to Stop New Power Plant Construction

While it's important to let legislators, other government officials, newspaper editors and your local grapevine know about the issues involved in meeting future energy demand, it's also necessary to tell the power company how you feel. Enclose a letter with every monthly power bill, addressed to the attention of the Board of Directors of Duke Energy, Progress Energy, Dominion or whoever your electricity provider may be and explain to them that you don't want your money being used to build and operate new coal-burning, fossil fuel or nuclear power plants. Sample letter.

Public Hearings Set on Duke's Cliffside Power Plant Expansion

From a flyer circulated by Carolinas Clean Air Coalition:

DUKE ENERGY WANTS US

TO PAY $3 BILLION FOR A COAL PLANT

50 MILES WEST OF CHARLOTTE

Duke Energy has proposed building one of the nation’s largest coal plants at its CLIFFSIDE site, directly upwind of Charlotte.

Comparable-sized facilities typically burn over 5 million tons of coal a year and emit huge amounts of global warming pollution and mercury, a toxic heavy metal.

The plant would further pollute Charlotte’s air, which is already out of compliance with federal air quality standards because of dangerous ozone pollution, risking the loss of hundreds of millions in federal highway funds.

Because initial cost estimates jumped from $2 billion to $3 billion, the NC Utilities Commission has offered the public another chance to comment on this “investment” which will be paid for by us, the ratepayers.

EXPANDING CLIFFSIDE will lock North Carolina into a dirty energy future –50 more years of blasting away the tops of Appalachian Mountains and pumping out 110 million tons of global warming pollution each year.

You Can Make A Difference.

ATTEND PUBLIC HEARINGS IN ON JANUARY 10 AND 11

AND/OR WRITE THE NC UTILITIES COMMISSION!

Charlotte Shelby

January 10, 2007 – 7 p.m. January 11, 2007 – 10 a.m.

Main Library Shelby City Hall

310 N. Tryon Street 300 S. Washington St.

PRESS CONFERENCE Outside at 6 pm

Please come attend or speak at these public hearings, or write the NCUC with your thoughts:

NC Utilities Commission

Re: Docket E7, Sub 790 (Cliffside)

4325 Mail Service Center

Raleigh, NC 27699-4325

There is a better way.

Duke has not seriously addressed alternative ways to meet our energy needs.

Yet plenty of evidence shows that energy efficiency programs and renewable,

clean energy could eliminate the need for these plants and at the same time

stimulate economic development, create jobs, and save ratepayers money!

A study by the NC Utilities Commission shows that NC can generate significant amounts of electricity from renewable, clean energy sources such as wind and hydroelectric power. Over 20 states and D.C. have passed renewable portfolio standards (“RPS”) that require utilities to get a certain percentage of electricity from clean, renewable sources.

Appalachian State University calculates that energy-efficiency programs could save NC $3 billion per year and support over 150,000 jobs at an annual salary of $42,000. The Cliffside expansion would cost $3 billion and provide less than 100 long-term jobs.

Electric Power Research Institute (the electric power industry’s own think tank) says that energy efficiency could reduce usage by 27-44%, eliminating the need for new coal-fired plants!

USE YOUR VOICE FOR A CLEAN ENERGY FUTURE

ATTEND PUBLIC HEARINGS ON JANUARY 10 ND 11

AND/OR WRITE THE NC UTILITIES COMMISSION

Duke has not demonstrated a clear need for this facility or explored other options:

Experts testified that Duke has not shown a need for so much new base load power and that Duke’s 10-year plan did not adequately explore other ways to meet new demand, such as energy efficiency and renewable energy.

The Utilities Commission should require Duke to pursue the least-cost option of providing power, which also happens to be the option that creates many more jobs:

The real cost of power plants -- which utilities are permitted to pass on to ratepayers, plus a profit margin -- would rise significantly in carbon-regulated system. Congress is already considering enacting a carbon tax to address global warming, and Duke should be required to factor in the possible costs of such regulation.

Coal costs are predicted to rise as supplies of other fossil fuels and easily-mined coal in the Appalachians diminish. Duke has not adequately considered rising coal costs.

No coal is extracted in North Carolina, so Duke will buy all the coal from out of state – sending hundreds of millions of dollars out of our state revenue stream annually.

The NCUC is charged with regulating monopoly utilities in the public interest:

Coal-fired power plants are not in the public interest, especially given the available alternatives that cost the same or less but don’t cause haze, smog, asthma, heart and lung disease, mercury poisoning of our children, or global warming pollution.

For more information contact:

Carolinas Clean Air Coalition (704)342-9161; director@clean-air-coalition.org

(For a good overview of developing events surrounding the Cliffside Power Plant visit

this summary by the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy)

Energy at the Crossroads Tour Ploughs Ahead

Ten organizations, so far, are co-sponsoring the Energy at the Crossroads Tour stops in the state of Georgia on January 23, 24 and 25. The Tour will be promoting the Georgia Energy Future Resolution as it continues the campaign for energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies while opposing the construction of new coal-burning, fossil fuel and nuclear power plants throughout the Southeast.

The Canary Coalition, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Southern Energy and Environment Expo, Action for a Clean Environment, Athens Green Party, Atlanta WAND, Nuclear Watch South, PSR/Georgia Chapter, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy and UUCA Earth Ministry are working together to heighten public awareness and plant the seeds of the groundswell that will be needed to change the energy paradigm, steering it away from the technologies causing air pollution, climate change and pervasive radioactivism in the envrionment.

The Stops in Georgia will include:

Savannah, January 23

11 am Press Conference at Johnson Square, on Bull Street between Bryan and Congress Streets,

7-9 pm, Public Forum, location to be announced

Athens, January 24

11 am Press Conference at City Hall

7-9 pm, Public Forum, location to be announced

Atlanta, January 25

11 am Press Conference at the state Capitol Building, Washington Street entrance

7-9 pm, Public Forum at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation

located at 1911 Cliff Valley Way, NE

Unitarian Universalist Congregation awards grant to Canary Coalition

The Unitarian Universalist Church of Asheville has a Share the Plate policy as part of its outreach ministry. On one Sunday each month the church shares the offering with a designated community organization that provides service, advocacy, or direct action that reflect its principles and values. For its work that “affirms and promotes respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are all a part,” the Canary Coalition was designated as the Share the Plate recipient on November 5, 2006. The amount collected for the Canary Coalition was $748.75

Thank you to the UU Church of Asheville! We will do our best to live up to the standards ideals and values we share with you as we work for clean air.

Canary Coalition Membership Reaches 1000 and Growing Fast

In 2006 the Canary Coalition experienced a growth rate in our membership of nearly 25% putting us over the 1000 mark for the first time. The only conclusion we can reach from this is that public interest and involvement is increasing and our efforts are paying off. Lets congratulate each other for our successes as we push onward for an acceleration to this process.

Grand Opening Party at New Office, February 2

Once again the Canary Coalition has moved its office to bigger and better digs. To celebrate the latest move and reaching the threshold of 1000 members, we will hold a grand opening party on the grounds of the new office at 48 New Dawn Lane, in Sylva, NC, starting at 7pm.

There will be live music, food and drink. Come join us with friends and family.

mapquest directions

for more information call 828-631-3447 or email info@canarycoalition.org

Membership Renewal Reminder

If you have not already done so, please renew your annual mapmembership with the CanaryCoalition and help keep the database updated with your most recent contact information. There is no annual membership fee, although all donations are gratefully accepted (and very much needed). All new and renewing members receive the interactive membership computer CD. The membership CD is a powerful tool that aids its owner in being a clean-air activist. It contains a 15-minute PowerPoint presentation about air quality issues and the Canary Coalition that can be shown to friends, groups, classrooms, etc. Also on the membership CD is a library of documents containing information about important air quality issues. There are also graphics for iron-on applications, printable membership forms and a link to the Canary Coalition website. For donations of $35 or more tee-shirts are available upon request.

Send contact information and donations to:

The Canary Coalition

PO Box 653

Sylva, NC 28779

or you can donate online