Thanks to EPA’s new greenhouse gas permitting authority, a proposed Wisconsin biomass plant has come under fire from green activists. According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel report:
It doesn’t make sense to issue a permit for the project because it would add emissions of carbon dioxide at a rate much higher than a natural gas-fueled power plant, said Mary Booth, an ecologist who is researching biomass projects for a national coalition called the Partnership for Policy Integrity.
“We looked at the permit numbers, and the emissions of greenhouse gases are six times higher from biomass than in the natural gas boiler,” she said. “It’s right there in the numbers, and yet they say we’re not going to consider any further use of natural gas as a way to make this facility cleaner because this is a biomass project.”
EPA has apparently not yet granted the biomass industry an exemption from its rules, and the enviros are making hay in the meantime.