Stop the New Coal-fired Power Plant Matagorda County
Stop the New Coal-fired Power Plant Matagorda County
A new coal-fired power plant in Matagorda County, TX will endanger the public health of residents in the region and fuel global warming.
Please take 2 minutes to and sign this petition: click here.
Then send this email to Matagorda County elected officials: click here.
*Please contact us if you would like to become more involved in stopping this facility - it already has considerable local opposition but they need all the help they can get.
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"White Stallion Coal Plant will harm the Public Health, the local Environment, Tourism, and lessen the Qualitiy of Life of all Matagorda County residents.
EPA February 17, 2009: CARBON DIOXIDE (CO2) smokestack emissions 24/7 from White Stallion Coal Plant will be the same as adding 1,734,579 cars to Matagorda County roads;
* Electricity rates will not decrease. The White Stallion Coal Plant has no control over the price$$ of electricity charged to Matagorda County residents.
* 61 of every 1,000 people living within 30 miles of White Stallion Coal Plant will have Asthma;
* Lung Cancer for Matagorda County is now 28%-60% above the State average.
White Stallion Coal Plant will further increase the mortality rate for residents of Matagorda County;
Feeding the White Stallion Coal Plant:
3 Coal Barges each day up & down the Colorado river.
Necessitates widening the river, Environmental permits. Property values along the river can be expected to decline. Recreational weekend home communities development will not occur;
— and —
Two 125+ car Coal Trains through Bay City each day;
* Coal Plants kill Tourism. In mountain & coastal Counties throughout the US, other State Tourism Departments partner with local County Commissioners to oppose newly proposed Coal Plants.
The much anticipated 2nd home/weekend home growth in Matagorda County will not materialize. Affluent communities refuse to allow smokestack Coal Plants, and their citizens won't build 2nd homes in communities that have them;
* Real Estate values along FM 2668 will drop by 50%;
* Toxic air pollutants MERCURY and DIOXIN, will negatively affect the livestock of the ranchers in the vicinity;
* The Coal Plant is located in the 100-year Flood Plain. EPA Sea Level Rise Map area would be flooded several times per month;
MERCURY is a toxic heavy metal:
Smokestack emissions will make the Colorado River un-fishable (same as Houston Ship Channel) — seafood from Matagorda County shrimp & fish farms will be unfit for human consumption (loss of income for Matagorda County Seafood Farms)
1/70th of a teaspoon MERCURY wind-borne onto a 20-acre lake will make the fish unfit to eat — and White Stallion will dump 100 lbs of poisonous MERCURY every year onto the Colorado River, Matagorda Bay, local Matagorda County Seafood Farms.
Lavaca Bay has been a EPA SuperFund Site since 1993 due to MERCURY - since 1988 has been closed to the taking of fish and crabs by the Texas Department of State Health Services."
-No Coal Coalition
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Texas is already due to experience increasing levels of drought and more frequent and intense natural disasters such as hurricanes and floods; among other effects of climate change.
At a time when the science is clear that world greenhouse gas emissions needed to have been decreasing already, emissions continue to rise (not even level out). The building of a new coal-fired power plant anywhere is insanity.
But even aside from global warming, the proposed White Stallion plant is not far from Houston, and the pollutants are expected to blow over through our city occasionally. We are already surrounded by facilities that have us breathing unsafe levels of cancer- and asthma-causing chemicals..the last thing we need is another coal plant! Not to mention the residents of Matagorda County.
Please take 2 minutes to sign this petition and then send off the email:
http://www.nocoalcoalition.org/
Get in contact if you would like to become more involved in stopping this facility!
"We need to reduce our atmospheric greenhouse gas levels to below 350 parts per million in order to avoid climate catastrophe, the U.S. and the world must begin phasing out coal immediately in order to reach that target."
— Leading climate scientist Dr. James Hansen (Director NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies)
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This is but one of 12 proposed coal plants in Texas:
Coal Star State: While America turns away from dirty energy, Texas could soon have 12 new coal-fired power plants. What gives? (Tuesday, November 10, 2009, the