PSJ officials “swallowed” misinformation from biomass developers

The city officials have passed the Biomass Development Order, but the citizens of Port St. Joe need to know about the misinformation about air pollution spread by the developers of the biomass incinerator, and the fact that the city officials never challenged it, but approved the local Development Order anyway.

On July 28, 2009, one of the biomass developers is on record as saying “two light trucks driven 14,000 miles per year emit more pollution” than the biomass incinerator proposed for Port St. Joe. Again, in a city and county commission meeting on Aug. 12, 2009, this same developer said “two SUVs driven 14,000 miles a year produces more pollution per year than the proposed plant.” The minutes of this meeting are posted.

The truth is Rentech’s Port St. Joe biomass incinerator will produce tens of thousands of times more pollution each year than two SUVs driven 14,000 miles a year – without even counting the trucks used to deliver the biomass fuel to the incinerator. According to the developers’ own reports, the Rentech incinerator will have 160 heavy duty truck trips a day delivering the wood, seven days a week, 365 days a year – common sense says that’s a lot more pollution than two SUVs, not even counting the pollution from the incinerator itself.

The developer’s statements defy common sense, but a recent engineer’s report was done just for the purposes of this comparison, and the results of this report are as follows (See No. 1 below):

The biomass incinerator and an SUV both burn fuel to produce energy, and although they burn different types of fuel, both emit some of the same chemical pollutants into the air as a result of the combustion process.

Two SUVs, like a Chevy Tahoe for example, emit only 42,338 pollutant pounds per year versus Rentech’s biomass 881,909,350 pollutant pounds per year of the same chemical pollutants. This shows the incinerator spews out tens of thousands times more air pollution than two Chevy Tahoes (See Nos. 2 and 3 below).

Now, let’s look at the air pollution comparison of two Chevy Tahoes versus Rentech delivery trucks. According to the same engineer’s report, the two Chevy Tahoes emit only 42,330 pollutant pounds per year versus 4,727,773 pollutant pounds per year of the delivery trucks. Just delivering the fuel to the incinerator emits drastically more air pollution than two Chevy Tahoes. (See Nos. 2 and 3 below)

Even if those who don’t believe there will be pollutants and other contaminants emitted from this incinerator, the heavy delivery trucks alone will dramatically add pollution to the air. Yep, city officials “swallowed” all of the misinformation – hook, line and sinker.

1. All backup documents can be found at www.gulfbiomassincinerator.org.

2. To be conservative, the data for the Chevy Tahoes is taken from the U.S. EPA for the dirtiest, most inefficient 2000 model year, 5.7 liter Tahoe. The Rentech incinerator information is taken from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection “Technical Evaluation Report: of April 27, 2011.

3. Data is based on Rentech’s “Traffic Impact Analysis Report” which says that 160 truck trips per day (80 round trips) on a daily basis would occur to deliver the fuel.

Dave Dorris is a resident of Port St. Joe