SocraticGadfly: Good news/bad news in Four Corners

February 18, 2011

Good news/bad news in Four Corners

Good news? The Navajo Tribe preliminarily keeps 1,000 jobs for what is about as close as you can get to a Third World country in the United States.

Bad news? It does that by extending for 30 years the lifespan of the single largest nitrogen oxides emitter in the United States — the Four Corners Power Plant.

The good news? The lease was upped from $1.5M a year to $7M a year.

The bad news? Nothing in the contract about improved scrubbers or other environmental actions.

Now, the tribe has its own EPA, and says that any changes in federal standards on either NOx or SO2 will be incorporated into its standards. But, with Team Obama making nice to big business, is there any guarantee the U.S. EPA will keep its bureaucratic nose to the grindstone? Stay tuned.

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