Sunday, October 17, 2010

Power plant scrubbers and water quality

I've said it before, so I'll say it again. Efforts to reduce air pollution by burning coal to generate electricity have created a new set of problems to deal with. I've mentioned how flu gas desulfurization units, or scrubbers, have required utilities to build landfills to place the sludge that comes out of the smoke. Now the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission has set standards for discharges into water from those scrubbers.

This isn't saying that scrubbers shouldn't have been installed, but actions tend to have unanticipated consequences that we have to keep our eyes on.

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