Just a 45-minute drive from Midtown, northeast Shelby County is remarkably rural.
Shady two-lane roads split forested tracts and
farms. Houses sit on large multi-acre plots with
horses and barns. Locals stop their cars in the
middle of the street to give directions. But change may be
in the air. Literally.
Three thousand residents have signed a
petition against two new power plants planned for their
area. Is it a case of NIMBY (not in my backyard)
activism, or, as they claim, a bad deal for everyone in
Shelby County?
Gathered around Tammy Fleskes’ kitchen
table, eating pizza, six of the activists talk about the
proliferation of merchant power plants in West
Tennessee and the one planned for 600 yards from
Sleskes’ property line.
A subsidiary of bankrupt energy giant Enron
purchased the land for the plant, and environmental
permits were recently cleared, they say. Now their
only chance to stop the plant is to convince the
Shelby County Commission not to change their zoning
classification from rural/residential to industrial.
“Memphis tries to promote itself with its
high quality of life and its ability to attract quality
industries, but in this case, we get all the pollution in
exchange for five or six [power plant] jobs,” says
Mark Lawrence, a member of Citizens for Responsible
Development. “And the industries that do benefit
us, like Dupont and the Allen Steam Plant, might
have to scale back or install millions of dollars worth
of pollution controls because of this new plant.”
(This is because only a certain level of total pollution in
an area is allowed by law.)
Lawrence adds that since power from the
proposed plant will be sold on the wholesale market, it will
not be taxed in Shelby County. Factor in the added
noise and air pollution, opponents say, and the new
plant is a bad deal for their community and the county.
Some published reports have the plant
scheduled to begin construction in May 2004, but plans are
on hold until Enron’s financial problems can be
worked out. Planned for a 100-acre plot now occupied
by cornfields, forests, and a lake, the plant is
estimated to cost over $100 million and produce 678
megawatts of power.
Lawrence says changing their area to
industrial zoning would mean it would be almost impossible
to sell their homes (unless it’s to an industrial
venture), and in the case of storm or fire damage, they
would not be allowed to rebuild. The Arlington area is
the last area available for residential development in
Shelby County, he contends. Activists fear that once an
industrial plant is built, the whole area will soon
become industrial because no one wants to live near
a polluting industry.
Water from the Loosahatchie River and
aquifer sources, access to Tennessee Valley Authority
power lines, a natural-gas pipeline, and cheap land make
the area a prime target for industries, but none of the
residents wants them, Sleskes says. Three thousand
people more than the population of Arlington
have signed a petition opposing the power plant, a
testament, activists say, to the countywide appeal this
issue has raised.
“Pollution doesn’t stop at the county line,”
says Fleskes, “so this should be an issue for everyone
in this area.”
Just five miles away from the proposed Enron plant
site, Memphis Light, Gas and Water is planning another
gas-fired power plant. And Shelby County is not alone in the push
to build new power plants. Five were planned for nearby
Haywood County until the state ordered a moratorium on new
plants until the impact could be studied. (The Enron plant
received its go-ahead before the moratorium was issued.)
The key issue that brought about the moratorium was
the plants’ effect on the water supply, says Vaughn Cassidy,
environmental coordinator for the Tennessee Department of
Environment and Conservation. Though merchant plants
typically only run during peak periods of energy consumption,
generally in the hottest summer months, they can use up to 10
million gallons of water per day, Cassidy says.
“Any [project] disturbing five acres or more has to have
a plan for storm-water runoff [how rainwater is
discharged into streams], but the only groundwater regulation is
to see if the wells are dug right,” Cassidy says. “At
present, there are no limits on how much water you can draw.”
The proposed plants need huge amounts of water
for cooling, although they would burn natural gas, a
cleaner fuel than the coal burned at the TVA’s Allen plant.
Allen produces 19,000 tons of both sulfur dioxide and
carbon monoxide per year, while the new Enron plant
(according to the company’s air-quality permit) would
produce only 45.6 tons of sulfur dioxide and 248 tons of
carbon monoxide.
Will Callaway, executive director of the
Tennessee Environmental Council, says the federal
Environmental Protection Agency will soon demand that local governments adopt
a tougher standard for ozone. Adding new sources of pollution is a step
in the wrong direction, he says. County health officials counter that the
new plant would be allowed even under the new standards.
But opponents of the plant point out that Shelby County is
already ranked in the top 20 nationwide for polluted air. They claim local air
is actually even worse because Shelby County has only two
air-quality monitoring stations, compared to over a dozen in Nashville.
The Citizens for Responsible Development are committed and
organized. They are fighting not just a power plant but for their rural way
of life. They also know they are fighting a giant company with experience in
finding ways to get their plants built despite local opposition. Enron hasn’t
yet attempted to change the zoning, but the residents know it’s coming.
Frustrated by the fact that she couldn’t sign the “no new
power plants” petition, Fleskes’ 14-year-old daughter started her own petition
for children in the area. It doesn’t count, at least not officially, but she
wanted the county commission to know that kids also care about a clean
environment.
“The power’s not for us, only the pollution,” Fleskes says. “How
can this be a good deal?”
