A new report from the Ontario Clean Air Alliance says Ontario Power Generation towers like a smokestack among other polluters because of massive emissions from its four coal plants.
The report, dubbed OPG: Ontario's Pollution Giant, takes direct aim at the coal-fired energy producer.
It finds that air pollution is not the only major pollutant being produced by OPG, but that toxic wastes are also being sent to disposal sites or buried in on-site landfills.
"When it comes to emissions of smog pollutants and greenhouse gases, OPG's coal plants are Ontario's pollution giants. In fact, OPG's coal plants produce 40 per cent of the carbon dioxide emissions reported by Ontario industrial facilities to Environment Canada and continue to be Canada's number one corporate source of greenhouse gases," said Jack Gibbons, Chair of the OCAA, in a statement.
The report includes some startling findings, claiming OPG's coal-fired plants are responsible for the following:
- 36 per cent of Ontario's airborne mercury emissions;
- 28 per cent of Ontario's industrial smog-causing nitrogen oxides emissions;
- 23 per cent of Ontario's industrial smog-causing sulphur dioxide emissions;
- 8 per cent of Ontario's industrial PM2.5 small particulate emissions that go deep into our lungs and cause asthma attacks, heart and lung diseases, strokes and premature mortality.
At the plants in Nanticoke and Lambton, carbon dioxide emissions increased by 20 per cent from 2004 to 2005, and by 90 per cent for all the coal plants since 1995.
But the pollution doesn't stop there, the group claims. According to the report, OPG plants also produce waste that contains toxic chemicals like arsenic and mercury, which is either buried in on-site landfills or sent off-site, often to cement plants where it is re-heated in cement kilns.
The Naticoke and Lambton plants are among the province's top-5 on-site landfillers of arsenic, lead and mercury, the report claims.
OPG's air pollution, combined with its on and off-site disposal levels, adds up to create a devastating environmental footprint, Gibbons said.
"The only real solution is to cut the giant down to size by eliminating coal burning and adopting cleaner solutions, like aggressive efficiency improvements, renewable power and highly efficient combined heat and power generation," Gibbons said.
He added that Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty should keep his promise to phase out coal plants by 2009.
