IOWA FARMERS UNION * PLAINS JUSTICE * SIERRA CLUB
BREAKING NEWS October 11th, 2007
Contacts
Mark Kresowik, Sierra Club, 319-621-7393
Carole Yates, Sierra Club, 319-277-4782
Gregg Heide, Iowa Farmers Union, 712-830-2224
Carrie La Seur, Plains Justice, 319-560-4729
Iowa Latest State to Reject Coal Plant
City Development Board rejects request for annexation
Des Moines, IA � For Immediate Release
Opponents of a massive new coal-fired power plant proposed in Waterloo, including the Sierra Club and the Iowa Farmers Union, won a major victory today. The City Development Board rejected the City of Waterloo�s request to annex land for the plant after hundreds of citizens protested the action at a hearing in September.
�It was clear that this annexation was not in the public interest,� said Carole Yates of the Cedar Prairie Group of the Sierra Club. �Coal-fired power plants are the largest source of global warming in the country and this proposal was a collection of worst practices � for our energy system, for our economy, for the environment, and for our community.�
The annexation proposal came before the City Development Board because a landowner, retired farmer Merle Bell, is standing against the plant. Last month more than 500 people rallied at Mr. Bell�s farm in support of Bell and against LS Power. His farm has been in his family for more than a century.
�I�ve lived on this land all my life,� says Bell. �I promised my father I�d never sell the farm and I don�t want to sell.�
Mr. Bell was joined in opposing the annexation and development of the site by neighbor Phyllis Morgan and 17 farmers who are opposed to plans for transmission lines across their land. The farmers� resistance attracted the attention of Iowa Farmers Union, which officially opposes the plant. �We have concluded that farmers benefit more from farm-based renewable energy than from giant new coal plants. We consider plants like this a threat to a sustainable, farm-based rural economy,� said Gregg Heide of Pomeroy, board member of Iowa Farmers Union.
Sierra Club and the citizen advocacy group, Community Energy Solutions, represented by non-profit law firm Plains Justice, filed briefs against the proposal.
�This is the beginning of the end for LS Power in Iowa,� said Sierra Club organizer Mark Kresowik. �States across the country are recognizing the dangers of overdependence on coal and have rejected new plants. It�s time for Governor Culver to truly embrace energy efficiency and renewable energy and say no to more dirty coal.�
Other states that have rejected new coal plants in favor of cleaner energy options in the past twelve months include Florida, Oklahoma, Delaware, Idaho, and California.
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