Sierra Club Sues Department of Energy Over Future IGCC Plant

Balch & Bingham LLP - Southeast Environmental Law Blog - Sierra Club Sues Department of Energy Over Future IGCC Plant
Sierra Club Sues Department of Energy Over Future IGCC Plant
March 11, 2011 9:31 AM
DOE awarded federal cost-shared funding to the Mississippi Power Company to develop a 582-megawatt IGCC plant in Kemper County, Mississippi. IGCCs are the latest technology for providing electricity from coal. IGCC turns coal into gas—synthesis gas (syngas). It then removes impurities from the coal gas before it is combusted. This results in lower emissions of sulfur dioxide, particulates and mercury. In addition to reducing these pollutants, the proposed plant will also undertake carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).

Sierra Club claims that DOE elected to finance the IGCC plant without fully disclosing its environmental impacts, and without undertaking any meaningful analysis of alternatives. With this lawsuit, Sierra Club seeks to enjoin DOE from releasing federal funding and from approving federal loan guarantees for the IGCC plant until DOE complies with NEPA and confronts the global warming impacts and other environmental consequences of this project both individually and cumulatively in combination with other federally funded projects.