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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Conservation Groups Oppose Four Corners Power Plant Lease

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Friday, May 30, 2014   

PHOENIX – Conservation groups are calling on the federal government to not allow the Four Corners Power Plant to burn coal for another quarter century.

Mike Eisenfeld with the San Juan Citizens Alliance says the U.S. Interior Department is considering a 25-year lease on the power plant with Arizona Public Service (APS).

He says an environmental impact statement predicts the Four Corners Power Plant will continue to emit high levels of carbon dioxide, which contributes to climate change.

"This document hardly even recognizes the enormous impact the Four Corners Power Plant would have on the entire Southwest region, when it comes to climate change and disruptions of natural systems, and the drought conditions that exist here," he states.

The plant is located near Farmington, New Mexico, and provides electricity to Phoenix and other parts of the Southwest.

Arizona Public Service is hoping to extend a lease with the federal government on the coal-fired power plant that would start in 2016.

Eisenfeld says the federal government appears to be at odds with itself, given the recent release of the National Climate Assessment.

The report says as temperatures continue to rise, droughts in the Southwest will be longer, prompting dryer conditions that will cause more major wildfires.

Eisenfeld says it doesn't make sense that the Interior Department would approve a coal-fired power plant, which he calls a major contributor to climate change in the region.

"The federal government's saying, 'You know, we need to take immediate action to stop this environmental catastrophe,'” he points out. “We're kind of going, 'Does the left hand know what the right hand is doing here?'

“A climate action plan's coming. There's a good chance that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions are going to be regulated. There are other regulatory issues associated with this 50-year-old coal plant."

According to Eisenfeld, the Four Corners Power Plant emits more than 10 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year.

He says the hope is that the Interior Department will opt to replace the coal plant with renewable energy, such as solar power, within the next few years.






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