Robeson County ‘renewable energy’ plant criticized for being a ‘major polluter’
Meridith Allen is worried her family will suffer if a facility that burns poultry litter and parts for fuel is allowed to resume operations near her home.
Allen lives in Lumberton, about two miles away from a facility where NC Renewable Power feeds poultry waste and “poultry cakes” into a pair of boilers to generate electricity. The plant has been shut down since November 2020 but when it is in operation, it also uses steam from those boilers to run three belt dryers that can dry out as much as 90 tons of wood chips each hour before they are sold offsite, according to permit documents on file with the state.
These activities lead to emissions of pollutants like carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide, all of which can affect human health and are regulated under the Environmental Protection Agency’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration rules. Allen worries that emissions from the plant could exacerbate her son’s asthma or a condition her husband has that causes blistering on his lungs.
“That carbon monoxide and the sulfur dioxide, everything that they’re releasing from the plant makes it worse,” Allen said of her husband’s condition, “and at any point he could have a collapsed a lung or have to go in and have more surgery done.”
NC Renewable Power is asking the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality to modify its permit so that it can be regulated as a major source of air pollution and ultimately resume operations. Under its existing “minor permit,” the company can emit 250 tons each of pollutants like carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxides without facing penalties.
If approved, the proposed permit would require NC Renewable Power to install emissions control technology that would lower levels of nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxides. But if the plant operates at capacity over a year-long period, the plant could legally emit as much carbon monoxide and total greenhouse gases — 1,224 tons and 438,825 tons, respectively — as it can under its existing permit.
More than 30 opponents of the NC Renewable Power facility spoke at a virtual public hearing on Monday, outlining concerns ranging from how emissions will affect people living in nearby Lumberton to whether the company is conducting adequate monitoring.
NC Renewable Power was North Carolina’s 10th-largest emitter of carbon monoxide in 2017, the last year for which the Environmental Protection Agency has data available. At 1,262 tons, the plant emitted more carbon monoxide than at least seven other power plants, including several that were powered by coal.
NC Renewable Power’s history
The Hestertown Road facility was built as a coal-fired power plant in the 1980s by Cogentrix, but closed in 2009. Georgia Renewable Power reopened the plant in 2015 under the name NC Renewable Power.
In its initial May 2015 permit, NC Renewable Power was allowed to burn chicken litter, but not coal, natural gas or some other fuels. The plant was allowed to emit 250 tons per year of each of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide.
Carey Davis, Georgia Renewable Power’s executive vice president, wrote in a statement that when it opened the facility, the company believed the 250 tons-per-year limits would be adequate for the poultry waste the plant intended to burn.
The plant added poultry litter to its fuel mix in October 2015. The next year, the plant was nearing its annual carbon monoxide limit by March 7.
That led to a consent agreement with DEQ.
After the boilers released 46.2 tons of carbon monoxide in September 2016, the company was forced into a second consent agreement. That same month, the facility’s total carbon monoxide emissions for 2016 broke the 250-ton mark, violating its permit.
That second consent agreement, reached in January 2017, requires Georgia Renewable Power to use “the best available technology” to seek a permit that would address emissions of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide under Prevention of Significant Deterioration rules. If the permit is issued, it would replace the consent order.
Since 2016, DEQ has levied more than $76,000 in fines against NC Renewable Power, with violations ranging from exceeding limits for pollutants to having excessive down time for pollution monitoring equipment. Those penalties were spread across seven notices of violation and resulted in the consent agreements between regulators and the plant’s owner.
“Fines are not a deterrent for this company,” Anita Cunningham, a Robeson County resident who lives about two miles from the plant, said during Monday’s public hearing.
In an email, Davis wrote that approval of the permit would let the company update the technology it uses to control emissions and maintain its boilers in a way that would limit pollutants. The facility, Davis wrote, “will not restart operations until the emissions control technology upgrades are installed and boiler maintenance is complete.”
Burning poultry waste for power
Burning poultry waste for power became part of North Carolina’s energy mix with a 2007 law requiring utilities to include renewable power sources in their portfolios. That law also required utilities to generate a total of 900,000 megawatt hours of power from poultry waste by 2016, a benchmark that the NC Utilities Commission ratcheted down several times.
Many people at Monday’s public hearing said the plant’s proximity to communities with high proportions of people who are American Indian or Black or who earn lower incomes raises concerns about environmental justice.
An analysis by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality found that 41% of the 606 people living within a mile of the plant are Black, more than 10% higher than both state and Robeson County; and 16% identify as American Indian. Within a mile of the facility, DEQ estimated that per capita income over the last year was $16,644 — less than Robeson County’s $17,161 and much less than North Carolina’s $28,123.
“We’re the poorest county,” Allen said. “We already have some of the worst air in North Carolina and then to place these plants in Black, brown, indigenous communities, very poor areas — that just seems very unfair.”
Patrick Anderson, a Georgia-based attorney representing the Environmental Integrity Project, said the NC Renewable Power facility should also be classified as a major source of hazardous air pollutants associated with its drying belts. Right now, Anderson said, the plant is only accounting for formaldehyde and methanol that are released when wood is dried out, not four additional chemicals that are commonly associated with drying operations.
“A major source (of hazardous air pollutants) is subject to far more stringent emissions limits, monitoring requirements and testing requirements,” Anderson said.
He suggested that the facility be required to use catalytic oxidation to control pollution. That process burns emissions at high temperatures, destroying some pollutants and turning carbon monoxide into carbon dioxide — trading a poisonous gas for one that causes climate change.
Georgia Renewable Power facilities in the state of Georgia use the technology, Anderson said. The company argues that catalytic oxidation cannot be installed in the Robeson facility because the chemical makeup of the poultry litter could vary, limiting the control’s effectiveness.
“They’re basically arguing that because we burn poultry waste, we emit a lot of carbon monoxide, but we can’t install a control to reduce carbon monoxide because we burn poultry waste,” Anderson said.
This story was produced with financial support from 1Earth Fund, in partnership with Journalism Funding Partners, as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work.
This story was originally published February 26, 2022 at 8:30 AM.