Colorado Springs wrestles with sulfur dioxide pollution from central coal-fired power plant

COLORADO SPRINGS — Colorado’s pretty second city, aiming to play up its “city for champions” role as a base for Olympians, faces intensifying friction over foul air from an 80-year-old, coal-fired municipal power plant that pumps out sulfur dioxide.

It is an example of lingering air pollution problems that the Clean Air Act, signed by President Richard Nixon in 1970, was meant to fix.

For decades, the coal-fired Drake plant at the heart of Colorado Springs has emitted up to 9,000 tons per year of sulfur dioxide (SO2) — toxic gas that hangs in the air and mixes into a plume against mountains.

And since the federal government set a national air quality SO2 health limit seven years ago, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, EPA and city officials have failed to install a measuring system they consider valid.

Read more: http://www.denverpost.com/2017/01/15/colorado-springs-power-plant-sulfur-dioxide-pollution/