Old Dominion Electric Cooperative (ODEC) recently started on its course to build a $6 million coal-fired power plant in the small town of Dendron, Virginia. They plan to call the it Cypress Creek Power Plant. This plant could have positive impacts on the economy of the area, but will undoubtedly have negative impacts on the health of the people living around it and the area's overall environmental quality.
Because the plant will be situated on land that falls under both Surry County and the Town of Dendron, both had to approve the project. ODEC's main reason for constructing this plant here is that they expect electricity demand in this area to double in the next 20 years. This specific area was chosen because of its proximity to railroad lines, which could be used to transport coal, and the James River, which would provide water to cool the machinery.
For this plant to be built, zoning regulations had to be changed. The Town of Dendron and Surry County have approved these changes, despite citizens' obvious negative opinions toward it. Many others besides the citizens of Dendron and Surry county are opposed to this plant being built, including the Sierra Club. They have been supporting the citizens of Dendron and advertising against the construction of the plant in its Beyond Coal campaign. A lawsuit has even been brought up against Dendron's Town Council, asking that their vote to rezone land for the plant be nullified because the citizens were not informed of the date that the council voted on this issue. Former gubernatorial candidate, Brian Moran, also opposes the construction of the plant. He and others living in the area are concerned about the health implications this plant is going to have. They are also concerned because much of Surry County and the surrounding areas are at sea-level. People are concerned about the effects that rising sea-level will have on their homes; rising sea-level that is caused by increased carbon dioxide in the air. Estimates say that Cypress Creek Power Plant could release as much as 14.6 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. Even though ODEC has attempted to make this deal as positive as possible for the citizens of Dendron, for example, they offered the town money to build new sidewalks and playgrounds and to fix their water system, the citizens still oppose it. Cypress Creek Power Plant should not be built because of its negative environmental and health effects and because it does not have the total support of the community.
images from:
http://gcvconservation.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/coal-plant.jpg
https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/423/images/Fans.jpg
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