Newark Residents Listening To TDC Power Plant Double-Speak? Plus, Environment Issues Update

 

I was at the meeting last night and will have a lot to say about it - to come later soon. A lot of the information presented was contradictory and begs the question: do they even know what they are doing? Or do they know and are simply mischaracterizing things? Time - and a lot of work vetting what was stated last night as "fact" - will tell.

Newarkers plan on attending the next (not yet scheduled) city-sponsored public meeting, TDC's DNREC public hearing on the air permit application as well as scheduling some public meetings of our own on the subject. 

As residents gathered after the meeting adjourned, many noted huge, gaping holes in TDC's "story". The company's statements, captured on video, will be thoroughly vetted and analysis of fact vs. fiction will be placed in the public record one way or the other. Get Ready.

(News Journal) Melissa Nann Burke reports ~ Newark residents rebuff proposed data center

NEWARK — The developers of a data­processing center proposed on the for­mer Chrysler assembly plant site say the facility’s gas-fired turbines will produce a minimal amount of noise for neighboring residents and produce fewer emissions than a traditional pow­er plant.

Despite these reassurances, many Newark residents made it clear Tues­day that they’d prefer The Data Cen­ters LLC build its center elsewhere – largely due to the 248-megawatt gener­ating facility that comes with it. “This is a data facility, folks, it’s not a power plant,” Data Centers CEO Gene Kern said. “We’re not generating electricity and selling it to the grid.” “But you are,” a chorus of audience members re­sponded.

No Newark Power Plant reports ~ A question for The Data Centers, LLC--why not use a real renewable energy source? Apple does it!

Newark is a residential community of 30,000+ and not a large industrial complex–it’s no place for a gas-powered turbine power plant.
It’s important to note that data centers do not need gas-powered plants to exist. They can tie into the existing grid or be built off-grid via accompanying green, renewable power creation (which natural gas is not).
Apple, one of the largest companies in the world, has done it. In fact, according to their website, Apple’s goal “is to power every facility at Apple entirely with energy from renewable sources — solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal.”
To that end, Apple has built a solar-powered data center in Maiden, North Carolina and is adding a 2nd one by the end of 2013. To support their solar power generation, they also have built fuel cells that utilize directed biogas for power storage. All told, this project produces “enough onsite renewable energy — 167 million kWh — to power the equivalent of 17,600 homes for one year.”
And that’s just one facility. Apple also has data centers around the country utilizing wind, hydroelectric, geothermal and solar.  In Prineville, Oregon; Newark; California & in Reno, Nevada.

If Apple can do it, why can’t The Data Centers, LLC?

Doug Rainey's Business Bulletin covers meeting and links to No Newark Power Plant

Meanwhile, DailyKos' Green Diary Rescue ~

The United Progressive Movement Against ALEC—by Phil Radford II Greenpeace: "Corporate money is currently flooding our political system and drowning out the voices of everyday Americans. We are gathering together in Washington to send the signal that this is still our fight-and we have the momentum to win it now.  People from across the country are fighting to tip the balance of power back to the people, and away from big money and bigotry. We want to realize Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream of America, but we can't do it if we're divided into separate groups."

Energy
Breaking: Japanese Government takes over Fukushima cleanup—by Horace Boothroyd III: "After over two years of being continually lied to by the corporation claiming to stabilize the critically damaged plant, Japan takes over. Now that we know that radioactive water has been leaking since day one into a water table adjacent the Pacific Ocean and unknown exposure to the population of the Pacific Rim could be worse than that of Chernobyl. We do know that they were planning to attempt pick up sticks with fuel rods in an environment that destroys robots and the first responding engineers alike."

Entergy's Vermont Yankee Nuclear Plant closing down by the end of 2014—by Lefty Coaster: "This is very good news. Plan to close Vermont Yankee marks latest blow to nuclear power: The Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon, Vt., will be shut down by the end of next year due to financial factors, the company that owns the plant announced Tuesday, in the latest sign of a difficult economic climate for nuclear power companies. Entergy Corp., the New Orleans-based company that owns Vermont Yankee, plans on closing and decommissioning the plant by the fourth quarter of 2014, in cooperation with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It is the fifth nuclear plant this year to close or to have plans made for its closure."
Nuclear energy: Lessons from Japan (and Murphy)—by Ivy Main: "A friend asked me recently whether I thought the ongoing disaster at the Fukishima nuclear plant in Japan would have repercussions here in Virginia, where Dominion Power operates four nuclear reactors at two plants and wants to build another. I feel pretty sure the answer is no. Economics will kill Dominion’s nuclear dream, but not risk. We just don’t think that way. We think like this: Fukishima was taken out by a tsunami. There are no tsunamis in central Virginia. Ergo, there is no risk to Virginia’s nuclear plants from a tsunami, so Japan’s sudden revulsion against nuclear power shouldn’t put us off our feed half a world away. So why did countries like Germany, which also has no tsunamis, freak out and swear off nuclear for good? They drew an entirely different lesson: Japan is a smart, technologically-advanced nation. Japan did not anticipate the disaster that destroyed Fukishima. Ergo, unanticipated disasters happen even in smart, technologically-advanced nations."

Renewables
Wind, Water, Solar how New York State could get the fossil fuel monkey off its back—by Horace Boothroyd III: "Much has been said to try and insist that there would be no way to replace everything we do with electric. That it is impossible to use solar in northern climes and that wind is too intermittent. But no studies have been done to assay the reality of such broad denials of alternatives. New York State was known, before warming became the norm, to have harsh snow packed winters. It is also densely populated and full of industrial infrastructure.  So it is an excellent place to show how wind, water, and solar (WWS) can be utilized in such a manner as to ensure total renewable energy utilization. To completely cut away the, expensive in all aspects, fossil fuel umbilical cord."

Fracking
We Deserve Facts on Marcellus Shale Air Quality Impacts—by jessewhite: "There has been a sudden burst of activity in the media in recent days regarding air and water pollution from the heavy industrial sites involved in the Marcellus Shale drilling process. Beyond the drilling sites themselves, the focus has been on compressor stations and processing plants, as well as the wastewater impoundments where millions of gallons of hazardous waste from far beyond the local community are being hauled in at an alarming rate. The enormous natural gas processing plant in Chartiers Township operated by MarkWest, the midstream company for Range Resources, has been the center of much of the attention. Following last month’s problems which included large clouds of black smoke visible for miles away, a new problem related to a power failure caused more heavy black smoke emissions last week. MarkWest said the problem requires specific manufacturing of parts and could take several months to fix, asking residents to be patient. In a move that surprised nobody who has ever dealt with them, the PA Department of Environmental Protection said they have no intention of taking any specific action to ensure the problem is fixed."

New Fracking Deregulation Used by Corporation That Lobbied For It to Sue PA Families—by ProgressivePatriotPA: "This is a video from my show Counterpoint PA, the only grassroots progressive newscast exclusively about Pennsylvania politics. In this video, I report about a new deregulation of the controversial natural gas drilling process called hydraulic fracturing or fracking in Pennsylvania that was used immediately after it passed by a corporation that lobbied for it to sue scores of Pennsylvania families and a Pennsylvania business to get to the natural gas under their land, and give due credit to PA House Republican who voted against it for now seeking cosponsors to repeal it."

Assembly Committee Approves 'Woefully Inadequate' Fracking Bill - California

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