The European Court of Justice has ruled that the Aberthaw coal fired power station in Wales is in breach of pollution limits following a lengthy legal battle with the British government.
The issues began because, due to the low volatility of Welsh coal, the plant has to operate at higher capacity that conventional coal plants, and was permitted to emit higher amounts of nitrogen oxide as a result.
However, early last year, the European Commission challenged the UK government’s granting of permission for higher than normal emissions, arguing that not enough had been done to limit air pollution from the plant. The EC argued that, at 60% of the total, not enough of the coal being burned was locally sourced in order to permit the level of emissions that were coming out of the plant. The final ruling, which cannot be appealed, was reached this week, and the plant was found to be in breach of legal limits, with action needing to be taken.
The Aberthaw plant was found to have been exceeding the legal limit for nitrogen oxide emissions by more than double. The excessive amount of pollution coming out of the plant was highlighted recently when environmental charities Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth Cymru published a study claiming that every year up to 400 premature deaths across the UK could be attributed to Aberthaw’s nitrogen oxide emissions.
Aberthaw’s operator, RWE, had already planned to scale back operations at the plant by 2017 so that it would only operate at periods of particularly high demand. These, and other steps already taken to attempt to cut down the plants emissions, were highlighted by a spokesperson for the Welsh government who spoke about the EC’s ruling.
The spokesperson said: “The U.K. argued EU legislation applied a different emission limit to Aberthaw to reflect its unusual design, which was linked to its local Welsh coal supplies.
“The operator’s investment in Aberthaw has already reduced its emissions and further investments are being made to deliver additional reductions over the remaining life of the station during the transition to lower carbon energy generation.”
RWE has announced that they will be taking on board the EC’s ruling and will be taking steps to decrease emissions in order to make the plant fully compliant. Steps include changing the way the plant works so that it uses a higher portion of international coal, reducing the total emissions.
The station manager at the plant, Richard Little, said: “We believe that with plant efficiencies, modifications, and changes to our operating regime, the station can continue to support security of supply into the 2020s.”
