Cutting the Costs of Coal

Ditching coal-fired power may be the best move America can make to improve its health and its economic bottom line.

Cardiovascular disease, asthma, chronic respiratory problems and premature deaths caused by air pollution from these plants cost Americans an estimated $160 billion every year in health-care expenses, according to the non-profit Earth Policy Institute. Ground-level ozone, which one government agency says contributes to anywhere between $40 and $50 billion a year in health-care bills, also costs farmers an estimated $500 million loss in crop production every year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, due to its damaging effect on crop yields.

These pollutants have been mitigated, to some extent, by EPA regulations requiring old plants to install scrubbers and "selective catalytic reduction units" (SCRs), which remove sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, two pollutants that lead to particulate pollution, acid rain and ozone. But these rarely address all the problems of coal. "Sticking a scrubber or SCR on a coal plant is just putting a Band-Aid on the problem," says Valerie True, spokesperson for the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. They don't address global warming, she notes, adding, "Older coal plants really do need to be retired."

Renewable energy technologies can replace them, cutting power-plant emissions and their hidden costs to near zero, but subsidies for new coal power stations create an unlevel playing field, say environmental groups such as the Sierra Club and Citizens for Clean Energy. Due to a lack of political will at the federal level, states have taken matters into their own hands, some providing homeowners with rebates on photovoltaics and renewable energy generation and others like Florida and California passing laws that will require utilities to greatly increase their renewable energy supplies.

"In many cases these solutions will help the state," says True. "Often, coal is imported from out of state. If you can generate more energy locally, you can keep more money in your state." But state-level action can only help so much. "Because these plants are such big sources of pollution, and plumes go so far, their most serious effects are widespread," says Janice Nolen, assistant vice president of national policy and advocacy at the American Lung Association.