[S-C] Greenaction updates and alerts, including Red Bluff, Medicine Lake, San Joaquin Valley & Bayview Hunters Point

[Bradley Angel]

Please visit Greenaction's website for updates, photos and alerts including:

 

*Greenaction and Red Bluff residents are fighting InEnTec's attempt to
overturn our victory in the successful appeal of the company's permits for a
plasma arc medical waste facility.  Read the latest news in this historic
fight that has local, national and international implications for waste
industry attempts to build facilities using a new generation of incineration
technologies that will pollute the air and harm pollution prevention,
recycling and renewable energy programs.

 

*See photos and read about the protest by Pit River Indian Tribe members,
Greenaction and many Native and non-Native supporters at Calpine's
headquarters in San Jose, California to oppose giant power plants proposed
near Medicine Lake.

 

* Community Action to shut the PG&E Hunters Point power plant, San
Francisco, April 11, 2006 at 12 noon! 

 

* Statewide march and rally for environmental justice, and to demand the
closure of the Covanta incinerator in Crow's Landing, San Joaquin Valley of
California. Saturday, April 1, 2006, Patterson, California.

 

GREENACTION NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT! Across the U.S. and now in other countries,
Greenaction is helping communities protect their health and environment and
fight for justice. Your help is needed to enable us to keep winning David
versus Goliath battles for environmental justice.  Please donate online at
http://www.greenaction.org <http://www.greenaction.org/>    Thank you!

****************************************************************************
**************

InEnTec appealing for reinstatement of permits * Firm still wants to build
plant in Tehama County

By Kimberly Ross, Redding Record Searchlight  ***  February 4, 2006

RED BLUFF - A proposed medical waste disposal plant may have lost its air
pollution permit appeal, but its executives haven't given up on building in
Tehama County. 

InEnTec Medical Services California, is asking a Tehama County judge to
reverse a hearing board's decision, rather than dropping the project or
reapplying for two revoked air pollution permits, CEO David Farmer said
Friday.  "We could (reapply), but the concern is, we'd find ourselves right
back in front of that hearing board, because the permits would be appealed,"
he said. "We'd find ourselves with the same outcome." 

InEnTec filed the petition for writ of administrative mandamus in Tehama
County Superior Court on Thursday. The document seeks to undo the decision
of the five-member hearing board of the county Air Pollution Control
District. 

After the 80-hour appeal hearing, the hearing board in December revoked two
permits issued by the air district. 

InEnTec can't build its $10 million medical waste melter plant south of Red
Bluff without the permits. 

The appeal board favored a nine-page list of findings by two groups opposing
InEnTec: The Citizens for Review of Medical Waste Imports into Tehama
County, and Greenaction For Health and Environmental Justice. 

The document presented several arguments against the district's approval of
the permits, including: 

. several significant changes to the project, triggering a need for further
environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). 

A Planning department checklist shows the project would reach a full system
capacity of processing six tons of waste a day; the air district application
asks 17 tons a day; the district granted permits for 20 tons a day. 

. the lack of an Environmental Impact Report, an incinerator permit
requirement. InEnTec officials have said their project is not an incinerator
but a plasma arc melter that releases less pollution than an incinerator. 

. district officials testified they did not determine the project could
comply with state, federal and local air pollution regulations and failed to
scrutinize claims that the technology was "pollution free." 

Farmer said InEnTec could have corrected the permits if the hearing board
had outlined how. 

"They really gave no indications as to what their district did wrong, or
what was wrong with the permits," he said. "It's not clear to anyone." 

Bradley Angel, a spokesman for Greenaction, said the project's flaws are
clear, but numerous. 

"I'm not sure how they'd fix it because the problems are so severe. They'd
probably have to submit it all over again, (even) with the Planning
Commission, and that would delay the project years," he said. 

Meanwhile, the Tehama County Board of Supervisors, warned by County Counsel
William Murphy that InEnTec was likely to litigate, authorized him to
recommend an outside attorney to defend the district. 

"The Board of Supervisors has given clear direction that this hearing
board's decision is defended," he said. 

Murphy would not say how much money the board has authorized toward a legal
defense, however.  By comparison, the county's monitoring of a renewed
application from InEnTec would have brought "some internal costs, but
nothing like litigation," he said. "Litigation is expensive." 

                        

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.lumiere.net/pipermail/sustainable-city/attachments/20060209/4a3b82e5/attachment.html