Burning coal in power boilers

The company Norske Canada, which recently changed its name to Catalyst Papers, has been in the forefront of a push to burn coal in its power boilers in British Columbia, thus saving its reserve of natural gas from the Vancouver Island pipeline for profitable resale on the market. The company claims the coal burns hotter and cleaner than natural gas, but although there may be benefits in the boiler room, the long term environmental impact is (hotly) contested.

In Crofton BC in 2004, the company tried to begin "tests" of burning coal, tires and used treated railway ties, but quickly abandoned those plans in the face of the Crofton Airshed Citizens' Group and the funds raised from the Clean Air Concert.

In September 2005, Reach for Unbleached asked several questions about apparent irregularities in the testing and reporting which is being used to propound the idea that burning coal is clean. Here are links to download the letters objecting to this permit.

Reach for Unbleached: The Tests Are Flawed

Sierra Club of Canada, Quadra Group: Fix it!

Letters of objection to Norske Canada Elk Falls Application for fulltime burning of coal in a power boiler, Summer 2005

Reach for Unbleached cites requests for information

Sierra Club of Canada, Quadra Group on missing monitoring

Healthy Air or Cheap Coal

Comments on the original 2002 "test" burns at Elk Falls Pulp Mill, Campbell River BC.

September 2002: The pulp mill in Campbell River, after a three month test "approval", has applied for a full permit to burn an unlimited amount of coal in two power boilers. Our information indicates that the other three mills owned by NorskeCanada will follow suit, as will other pulp mills because it will save them each at least a million dollars a year.

The tests which supposedly justify this action have many flaws, including

• Only two hours of tests were done for many pollutants, even though the coal-test approval was for three months.

• Only one of the boilers where they want to burn coal has the most modern pollution control equipment, and that broke down frequently during the tests.

• The report used poor statistics, where an "average" value is reported when only two widely varied results were available, no margins of error or uncertainty are reported anywhere.

• Only the highest quality coal was tested - much lower quality coal can legally be burned.

• Testing was incomplete, or absent, for toxic chemicals known to be a threat to human health, such as mercury, methylated PAHs and Particulate Matter.

• There was an apparent increase in greenhouse gasses, which lead to climate change that will likely increase disease problems around the world.

These problems, and others, make this permit a bad idea. Especially because if one mill gets permission to burn coal, the others will be close behind. Do we want more than a dozen new coal-fired power plants in BC?