‘SUN INSTEAD OF COAL’
Group seeks to build solar array at shuttered Shenango Coke Works
The first request can be summed up as “sun instead of coal.”
When a trio of Pittsburghers traveled to Boston this week to ask the leaders of DTE Energy to put a solar array in place of the company’s shuttered Shenango Coke Works plant on Neville Island, the visual was easy to conjure.
But for good measure, Lewis Braham of Bellevue pointed out that the Michigan-based energy company, which closed Shenango in January 2016, has peppered its corporate documents with words like sustainability and environment. What better place to realize that, he argued, than in the graveyard of 56 coke ovens.
Thaddeus Popovich, formerly of Ben Avon, invited DTE’s CEO to hold the company’s next shareholder meeting in Pittsburgh, “at which time you will dedicate a new solar array facility,” he said.
“It will be a wonderful, uplifting event!” he promised.
Mr. Popovich also brought presents — copies of “Living Downwind,” a book that his organization, Allegheny County Clean Air Now, helped to publish last month, which is described as telling “the story of people and families trapped by an industry that subjected them to endless noise, pollution and the stench of rotten eggs.”
He made sure to bring enough copies for the board of directors and all the executives, Mr. Popovich said.
Stephanie Beres, a spokesperson for DTE, said the company is “exploring options for site redevelopment” and is “aware of the petition to build a solar array on the site.”
That petition, with 850 signatures, also was delivered to the board during the shareholder meeting.
“Since 2008, DTE has invested more than $2 billion in renewable energy throughout Michigan and we will remain focused on making Michigan investments to the benefit of
our electric customers,” Ms. Beres said.
For those keeping count, Michigan was mentioned twice in that statement. Pennsylvania — zero.
The trio’s second request requires a bit of explanation.
When DTE shut down Shenango, it could qualify for emission reduction credits that are given to facilities that curb pollution either by retrofitting to be cleaner, decreasing production, or closing up shop.
Shenango was emitting a host of pollutants, from nitrous oxides to small particulates to carbon monoxide and others.
In October, nine months after Shenango stopped making coke, the Allegheny County Health Department and DTE agreed to a deal to settle the firm’s outstanding environmental violations.
Instead of $481,275 in penalties, DTE would pay $225,000 and it wouldn’t avail itself of the emission reduction credits for stopping pollution of particulate matter and air toxics.
It was the first time in the health department’s history that it was able to negotiate with a company to voluntarily retire its emission reduction credits, said Jim Kelly, deputy director of environmental health.
But DTE can and has applied for emission reduction credits for other pollutants, such as nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide and sulfur dioxide. This would allow DTE to sell these credits to companies that need them to get air permits — essentially transferring their pollution allowance to a new entity.
Mr. Kelly said that getting rid of the fine particulate credits was most important.
Those emissions have a much heavier local toll — they get into people’s lungs and blood — than something like volatile organic compounds. The main concern with those, he said, is the formation of ozone which is something that’s a regional problem.
Besides, “it’s a negotiation,” Mr. Kelly said. “It would have been impossible to get all of it.”
That’s a point that Mr. Braham, Mr. Popovich and Angelo Taranto of Bellevue traveled the Boston Harbor Hotel this week to dispute.
“DTE Energy can do better than harming people because government regulations allow them to do it,” Mr. Taranto said at the shareholder meeting.
They asked the company to retire or donate those credits to an environmental organization.
Ms. Beres of DTE said the company hasn’t yet decided how the credits will be used.