People’s & North Shore Gas Reject Dirty Coal Gas

If you live in Chicago or the north suburbs, you can be proud of your gas company. They have chosen to reject Springfield’s attempts to force them to buy dirtier, more expensive gas from two risky coal-to-gas projects proposed for Chicago and southern Illinois.

Late Friday, People’s and North Shore announced they were choosing to stick with conventional gas despite the political pressure. According to Crain’s Chicago Business:

Peoples Gas is refusing to buy synthetic gas from a pair of politically favored plants on the drawing board for Chicago and Downstate Illinois, jeopardizing the multibillion-dollar projects.

Crain’s has learned the Chicago gas utility and its corporate sibling, North Shore Gas, told state officials Friday they won’t sign long-term purchase contracts with the coal-to-gas plants. State legislation enacted this summer cleared the way for the plants and sought to pressure large natural gas utilities into buying the facilities’ output.

Making synthetic natural gas from coal is a dirtier and more expensive way to get natural gas. The developers of both coal plants pledge to capture and somehow bury their millions of tons of carbon pollution deep underground, but Springfield’s power play doesn’t guarantee those plans in their pollution permits. The Chicago plant, proposed for the southeast side, has not disclosed how, where, or when they will bury their millions of tons of pollution.

We applaud People’s Gas and North Shore Gas for looking out for their customers, and deciding not to buy the dirtier, coal-derived gas from the risky Leucadia or Power Holdings coal plants. Customers in Chicago and the north suburbs can rest assured that they will not be heating their homes or cooking their meals with coal-derived gas that costs more and pollutes more than conventional natural gas.

We call on Nicor and Ameren to make the same decision, in the interests of their customers and the environment, and continue to deliver cleaner, cheaper conventional natural gas to the homes they serve.

Illinois EPA Moves To Protect Apple River From Massive Sewage Lagoon

Local residents, Sierra Club, and our allies working to protect a headwater stream in the beautiful Apple River watershed from being converted to a manure storage lagoon have won a major victory with Illinois EPA’s denial of an essential permit for the project.

A California company had proposed destroying approximately 300 feet of a tributary to the South Fork of Apple Creek to replace it with a waste storage and detention ponds for a proposed 5,500 cow dairy operation, which would be the largest in Illinois. The stream is upstream of the Apple River, including the excellent fishery at Apple River Canyon State Park.

Neighbors have long been concerned about air and water pollution from the industrial dairy. Last October, concerned citizens living close to the megadairy noticed that the previously clear tributary to the Apple River was suddenly dark purple. Representatives of both the Illinois EPA and the US EPA, as well as the Jo Daviess Sheriff’s department and the Jo Daviess Hazmat team were called to the site to evaluate the contaminants flooding into the stream.

After the discovery of the pollution, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan brought suit against the company for violations of Illinois water quality standards. The US Environmental Protection Agency has also scrutinized the facility, and Governor Pat Quinn has toured the region and expressed his concern about the megadairy.

In 2010, the Sierra Club, working with our allies, filed detailed comments urging Illinois EPA to deny permission to destroy the stretch of the stream. We are very pleased to see Illinois EPA taking this strong action to protect a unique state aquatic resource and the quality of life for residents of Jo Daviess County. Among the reasons cited by Illinois EPA in denying the permit were:

• Failure to demonstrate that the proposed activity would not cause violations of the applicable water quality standards
• Inadequate rationale for the need to lower water quality of the receiving stream, which would occur due to the placement of the fill material
• Inadequate explanation as to why impact to the South Fork of the Apple River cannot be avoided
• Inadequate information on the characterization of the receiving stream that is to be filled
• Failure to demonstrate that the proposed activity would not result in water pollution, based on the geology and hydrology of the site

runoff photo from http://www.Stopthemegadairy.com

For more information on the efforts of the concerned citizens of the area to protect their community from this pollution see www.StopTheMegaDairy.org

Restoration in the Cache River Watershed

After a century and a half of ditching, draining, over-logging, soil erosion, sedimentation and habitat loss in the Cache River watershed citizens and agencies formed the Joint Venture Partnership (JVP) and began the work of restoration.

As affirmation that the long road ahead to recovery was worth the effort the Cache River region was designated as a “Wetland of International Importance” at the 1996 Ramsar  Convention on Wetlands. Only 26 wetlands in the United States share this distinction.

Working together, the JVP and citizens created the Cache River Watershed Plan, which formed the foundation for C2000 project work to restore habitat, reduce sedimentation, and restore connectivity of the disconnected river.

Water retention ponds, constructed in the Big Creek watershed, have helped to reduce sediment load into the Lower Cache River from over 12 inches a year to less than an inch a year.

To date, landowners have protected and restored 13,500 acres of wetlands through NRCS’ Wetland Reserve Program.  Agencies and organizations have acquired 35,000 acres, reforested 22,000 acres, and restored 9,000 acres of wetlands.

Using various forms of conservation practices, landowners have reduced soil loss on 31,500 acres and built 90 water retention structures in Big Creek watershed. Approximately 9,000 feet of river has been dredged to restore water flow.

Riffle weirs, man-made rock structures that mimic natural river riffles, slow the flow of water thereby reducing stream bank erosion.

Agencies have also built 48 riffle weirs to stop stream bank erosion and 13 gully plugs to prevent adjacent wetlands from being drained. The Upper Cache River bank has been stabilized with gabion baskets to stop severe erosion that was threatening Heron Pond.

 

Although much has been done over the past two decades to restore habitat and reduce sediment a very important piece of the restoration puzzle still needs to be put into place—Connectivity Restoration. Tracy Boutelle Fidler, Restoration Coordinator for the JVP explains, “The Cache, like other rivers, needs free-flowing water to be healthy. A gentle current brings oxygen and dissolved nutrients, while also moving pollutants out of the system. For the Cache and adjacent natural places to remain healthy for future generations, some amount of flow must be re-established between its upper and lower segments.”

The next Cache blog will take a look at a plan to restore connectivity that considers the conservation need alongside the public need – protection from floods.

Source: Cache River Watershed Joint Venture Partnership

Green Is the New Normal

Normal turned a water infrastructure problem into a beautiful amenity

Conventional wisdom may hold that climate action and sustainability are on the back burner in the current political and economic climate, but that’s not Normal.

Led by Mayor Chris Koos, Normal, Illinois is moving fast to a better future by utilizing smart energy, transportation, planning, and water policies that are pushing the envelope, but at the same time make a lot of sense in the current economic climate.   State Sierra Club leaders had a chance to hear from Koos about many of these projects during a recent visit

Working with the town council, local businesses, and a vibrant community, Koos is making Normal into a showcase for smart sustainability. Here are a few of Normal’s recent successes:

Illinois Sierra Club leader Paras Bhayani talks transportation with Mayor Koos

• Rather than pave over some of the best farmland on earth with new sprawl, Normal has decided to invest where its citizens already live and work. A top priority is focusing investment on Uptown and the Main Street corridor, which were existing centers of activity with lots of potential. They listened to residents and local experts, and planned streets and sidewalks that are safe and inviting for pedestrians and bikes.
• Normal asked for the best building practices for these areas, becoming the first city in America to require commercial buildings to be LEED certified. Developers didn’t balk, they built. Now Normal has a bank headquarters, a transportation center, a Children’s Museum, and other state-of-the art buildings that don’t waste energy and offer a healthy indoor environment.
• Like most towns, Normal faces aging water infrastructure problems in Uptown, but fashioned a brilliant and beautiful solution: convert a leaky old sewer to an underground cistern to capture rainwater, run the water through a living fountain to cleanse it, and then use the water on Uptown’s great landscaping – sparing increasingly precious groundwater and providing a new green amenity that has become a community focal point.
• While some choose to demonize fast modern trains, Normal is seizing the opportunity that arrives with high speed rail investment. A new terminal will link high-speed Amtrak passengers with local buses, shuttles, and taxis; and makes Uptown a bustling job site for workers at a time when jobs are needed most.
• Normal is doing everything it can to encourage new development that offers residents transportation choices, but it recognizes that the car is the first, and only choice for many. That’s why it has launched the EV Town project, to prepare for electric vehicles. Mitsubishi, which has an auto assembly plant nearby, has pledged to ship at least 1,000 electric vehicles to Normal and Bloomington by 2014, and Normal wants to be ready. The first 33 public charging stations are in the works, already, with more to come.

All this is only the beginning. Koos and town leaders convened over 150 residents to prepare a Sustainability Plan to chart a course for the future, and it’s chock full of good ideas.

What’s perhaps most impressive about Normal leading the pack on sustainability is that the town is, well, normal. Normal doesn’t have especially unique geography, economic conditions, or demographics. Like anywhere, it has residents who want a cleaner environment, and need good jobs. But Normal does have Chris Koos, and with the support of the community, he’s quietly showing the way to a better future – for Normal, and for all of us.