This piece refers to a series of articles which have appeared in the Parkville (Missouri) Luminary.

It has been quite interesting to read the progress of the debate this spring regarding the proposed BPU power plant expansion in the pages of The Parkville Luminary. I think it is safe to conclude that the preponderance of opinion noted thus far in print falls into the "against" camp.

The "against" argument is a compelling one. I find myself agreeing with most, if not all of it. Without belaboring points already well-established, there are a number of things worth reviewing:

• "Clean coal" is a myth. Even the cleanest coal-burning plants emit particulates, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and mercury. The oxides of sulfur and nitrogen are the chief components of smog and acid rain. Particulates (very small solid emissions carried by wind) are directly linked to the epidemic of asthma in children and adults. Mercury is a severe nervous system toxin. Other pollutants associated with coal combustion include arsenic, beryllium, cadmium, chromium, hydrogen chloride, hydrogen fluoride, lead, manganese, thorium, and uranium.
• We don't need a lot more electricity. The utilities are developing the lowest present-cost alternatives (without regard to long-term health or societal costs, which are, in classic corporate fashion, "externalized" - somebody else - other living beings, including you and I - pays these costs) in order to generate electricity which will be sold to the "grid", or wider market. That is, this plant is not being built to meet a current or projected local need for more electrical power. We get the pollution, the "grid" gets the electricity. The balance between supply and demand can be addressed by greater emphasis on the demand side of the equation - that is, we can all do a better job of using less electricity (for more on this topic, go to www.aceee.org - the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing energy efficiency as a means of promoting both economic prosperity and environmental protection).
• There was for several years a surge of building substantially cleaner natural gas-burning power plants. This phenomenon has decreased precipitously, and it's no mystery why. The demand for natural gas is growing for a myriad of purposes, including its use as a feedstock for many chemicals, most nitrogen fertilizers, and, of course, home heating. Supply, however, is in decline  (http://www.mnforsustain.org/natural_gas_supply_in_decline_youngquist_duncan_1203.htm). And, should the production of synthetic oil from "tar sands" in Alberta and elsewhere ever get underway in earnest, vast amounts of the available natural gas will be employed in the process - to "cook" the tar (bitumen) into a useable synthetic oil. Consequently, we're back to an emphasis on coal as our main power fuel, with murmurs of renewed interest in nuclear power generation as well (more on why that's a bad deal in another article).
• Coal is a primary culprit in the worldwide assault of global warming. More than the other fossil fuels, coal is loaded with carbon. Burning coal leads to tremendous carbon dioxide emissions. And, of course, carbon dioxide is the most plentiful of the global warming gasses. If, by this point, you're still doubting whether there is global warming, or whether it has been caused by human activities (despite the preponderance of scientific validation that human-caused global warming is one of the most pressing issues - more, in fact, than global terrorism - that our civilization faces), I congratulate you on your inability to see the forest for the trees. U.S. Senator James Inhofe (R, Oklahoma), who last year claimed that global warming was a "hoax", would welcome you to his enchanted world, where giant oil conglomerates are regarded as benevolent uncles, here to protect and serve us.

On a personal level, I not only live downwind from the proposed power plant expansion, I am at English Landing Park frequently. My wife and I run on the trail every day, 6-1/2 to 7-1/2 miles. That's six hours per week that we spend in the area immediately downwind of the plant, engaged in an activity that increases our metabolic uptake of everything in the air. We're sort of counting on oxygen, not mercury.

But, there's a competing factor here, too. Our culture engages in many world-destructive activities. Most of these are arranged so abstractly that we fail to recognize that, in the long run, we're killing ourselves. The consequences of our actions are both so diffuse and so remote, we don't perceive the clear feedback of their destructiveness. Like the heart patient who continues to eat cheeseburgers, we hammer away at our life support system, consuming the world without noticing that our arteries are dangerously clogged. More suburban sprawl (see The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler for an in-depth, entertaining, harrowing look at all of the ramifications of our sprawling culture), more greenhouse gasses, more military adventures to secure our supply of those commodities to which we're severely addicted - yet we fail to notice, in a dizzying display of cognitive dissonance. So when a situation arises wherein there's a positive feedback mechanism - that is, we push the dog far enough, and the dog bites us - it is a valuable learning opportunity. In this case, we're running our large households on more and more electricity. Multiple refrigerators, TVs, computers, constellations of lights (walk around a neighborhood at night and see how many lights people leave on, and try to remember to be astonished, because it is astonishing if you're not numb), enormous square-footages, poor use of natural daylight and other architectural mishaps - the meter's really spinning.

One answer, of course, lies in clean, renewable power generation - small, environmentally-sensitive hydroelectric, wind, and solar. We need to advocate for more research and development in these areas, and start pushing the utilities to begin providing more right now. We also need to evaluate why our households should use as much electricity as they do. Perhaps there are some easy steps (compact fluorescent light bulbs, Energy Star-rated appliances [www.energystar.gov], smaller, more efficient houses) we can take.

In the April 28 issue of The Parkville Luminary, Dr. Lewis Robt deftly explored the NIMBY (not in my back yard) principle. I say "Why NIMBY (Why not in my back yard)?" As long as I am a user of electricity produced by coal-burning power plants, I must live with the consequences thereof. Consider the proposal for Parkville to operate its holiday-season lights all year: the irony that, the more electricity Parkville requires, the more it pulls from the electricity grid, the more the plant upwind works to create electricity, and the unavoidable pollution to be absorbed by Parkville. Hopefully, this will motivate us to become less consumptive, and to motivate the utilities to get more serious about renewable energy.

We must examine the fabric of our culture. Where there are rips and flaws, we must mend it, or replace the fabric entirely. In the meantime, let's take advantage of those positive feedback mechanisms when they present themselves. When we acknowledge our role in the events which displease us, let's change our behavior. We'll do well to recognize that we have a choice.