Letter to the Editor: Coal powered electric plants

By Russ Oakeson Ferron

Editor,
In regards to an article in the Deseret News April 15 “Coal-powered electricity increases pollution levels.” I do not believe in putting my trust in science, and so called facts.
I live away from the Wasatch Front, and incidentally I live near a coal fired power plant. There is technology today to burn coal and be environmentally conscious.
Plants today are being improved by the use of gas scrubbers, fly ash removal systems. True, we should look to other resources, hydro power is generated by backing up in our state the Green and the Colorado rivers, which I imagine is not very popular these days with environmental groups. Geothermal, solar, natural gas, and wind.
I feel there is nothing more beautiful than to see lines of wind turbines on the horizon. Yea right.
Is it not true that the Wasatch front is growing every year and with it increased use of the automobile? Even with improved emission controls, in my opinion it is the biggest contributor to the pollution problem. How about using mass transit which I am sure many do.
I rarely drive to downtown anymore when I go to Salt Lake and part of it is operated by electricity, also bigger homes to supply energy,and with more automobiles more roads to build in environmentally sensitive areas. Everything we have today has the potential to harm us or the environment. Human beings have been at risk ever since we came to earth.
As for human health we drive faster and more people are dying on our highways, and yes I believe there are substances such as drug and alcohol abuse, yet our life span seems as a whole to increase.
Geneva Steel is gone as is a lot of steel production in the U.S. Imagine that, and yet I can drive into Utah County from Spanish Fork Canyon and I still drive into an ugly cloud. It’s sunny where I live.
I do not believe your pollution should be put on coal generation, the wind usually blows out of the north if we did not have the Wasatch plateau dividing us from the Wasatch front we would have your smog in our area.
I have a hard time believing coal generation is causing your smog problem. On most nights the sky where I live is crystal clear and I can see the lights from the Wasatch from great distances. Lots of light huh?
In my opinion any time population increases in any valley, inversion will follow. I do not buy into global warming. Let us worry a little more about the trash along our highways, our mountains, streams, and lakes. Just look at a recreation area in our state after a holiday weekend. I feel as a society we take way more from our environment than we put in, a bigger home to satisfy vanity that takes more lumber and other raw materials, more cars per family.
That in my opinion is giving big oil pleasure. It would be nice to see people with a lot of money, politicians, and others, practice what they preach.
In the program “An Inconvenient Truth” the star is riding in a large automobile, hypocritical in my opinion, at least he could have ridden a bicycle.
Coal is still a reliable and can be a clean resource. The luxuries we have today still take electricity. It powers our homes and makes life much easier, it makes the news when it goes out, and we still take it for granted.
As populations increase there will be more shortages and outages than have already happened. Our world today reminds me of a story, The Sky Is Falling.