TVA Lawsuit

North Carolina's public-nuisance lawsuit against the Tennessee Valley Authority over pollution in the Great Smoky Mountains begins today in an Asheville federal courtroom. Several expert witnesses are expected to testify in a case that assesses public health, economics, environment and the role utilities should play in curbing damage to all three. Ever since North Carolina passed its own laws six years ago to drastically reduce emissions within the state, it has looked to upwind generators -- the TVA operates 11 coal-fired power plants in Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama -- to also meet its strengthened standards. But Attorney General Roy Cooper said the nation's largest utility has failed to follow suit. "The lawsuit is the last resort," Cooper said. "We can't wait for clean air. It's important for TVA to start taking steps now to clean up its coal-fired plants." Cooper argues the TVA isn't doing enough to control its coal-fired facilities, which he said release sulfur dioxi! de, nitrogen oxides and mercury eastward into North Carolina's mountains.
The state's experts will argue the pollutants cause annual public health costs in the billions, and that lowering the levels could reduce premature deaths by 1,400 annually across the region. Witnesses also say in court documents that emissions and the resulting haze damage plants, wildlife and visibility -- and, ultimately, North Carolina's tourism industry. North Carolina wants the TVA to lower emissions to levels comparable to its Clean Smokestacks Act by 2013. But the TVA, a federally owned corporation, contends that it is already -- and always -- working to reduce emissions and will to continue to do so by 2013. Attorneys for the agency argued that North Carolina bases its emissions estimates on the unreasonable assumption that the TVA won't make improvements in the next few years. Attorneys for the agency also say what little pollution that does enter the state from TVA facilities pales in comparison to the emissions from within the state. (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, 7/13/08).