Cleaning Up Our Dirtiest Power Plants
The South is home to a high number of coal fired power plants, many of which are old and outfitted with outdated pollution controls. The result is a disproportionate share of the nation's power plant pollution being generated in the Southeast. In fact, Southeastern states are home to 12 of the 50 most polluting power companies, including the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Southern Company, the nation's top nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide polluters.
©Tim Wright
Power plant pollution poses a severe public health threat to people in the Southeast. Across the SELC region, power plant pollution is responsible for over 5,000 premature deaths each year. Hundreds of thousands more suffer asthma attacks and other respiratory problems, many of which are severe enough to require trips to the emergency room. Specifically, particle pollution - tiny solids and liquid droplets of acids, chemicals, metals and dust that measure 1/20 the width of a human hair - penetrates deeply into lung tissue, leading to severe illness and premature death.
SELC has taken a multi-faceted approach to stopping power plant pollution at the source, including advocating for innovative legislation, like the Clean Smokestacks Act, to involve statewide utilities in the clean up of outdated power plants in North Carolina; working through the Clean Air Act to force the EPA to clean upwind pollution from North Carolina's air; working across the Southeast to combat proposed changes to the New Source Review program that would weaken utilities' responsibility to install clean-up technologies in their facilities; and taking legal action against some of the region's most polluting industries for not installing pollution controls as required by law.
