I testified at the Board of Public Utilities  “draft 2011 Energy Master Plan” Public Hearing in Newark on August 26th.

The opening part of my statement was to commend the statement in the EMP: “…coal is a major source of CO2 emissions and New Jersey will no longer accept coal as a new source of power in the State.”  Then I went on to say this left a loophole for PurGen since it would sequester its CO2…

Lee Solomon, president of the BPU, interrupted me and said: “Stop. You don’t have to say anything more about PurGen. There will be no PurGen. That project is not going forward as a coal carbon sequestration plant. The Governor has said ‘no’ to any coal. That’s a done issue. It cannot even be inferred. There is no loophole. I say that publicly, and on the record, and so did the Governor.”

to which I replied: ” Well that’s great news! I have not heard the Governor say so publicly since he was elected, only as a campaign statement…”

President Solomon said: “Well I’m saying it publicly: there will be no PurGen. I can’t see how it can be more public or more clear.”

Wow.

Again, at the BPU Public Hearing in Pomona on August 11th, another activist again asked about PurGen. She also commended the draft EMP for its commitment to refuse coal sources of energy. Again, she pointed out that there was some concern still because there was no specific statement in the EMP addressing the administration’s position for or against so-called “clean coal” technology, and more specifically, PurGen. Once more, Board President Lee Solomon said, “Haven’t I said this before? There will be no PurGen. The Governor has been clear about this.”

He then caught himself and clarified what he meant by saying that he shouldn’t speak about PurGen (SCS) as a corporation since that would be biased against one company; his comment was about carbon capture and sequestration in general terms. Our activist then requested that this strong ‘no-carbon capture and sequestration’ phrasing be clearly added to the EMP… we shall wait and see if that will be added.

Today, August 24th (at the continuation of the August 3 hearing), Sally Jane Gellert testified on behalf of the Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry of New Jersey.  She asked, “Does this mean that there will be no PurGen—that the experimental so-called ‘clean coal’ plant that was proposed for the state-designated environmental justice community of Linden in Union County has been rejected?”  President Solomon asked her, “Would you like me to answer that?”  When she replied in the affirmative, he once again stated that there would be no coal plant in Linden.  

Does BPU President Solomon’s statement have any power or validity behind it?  Only time will tell; the DEP still has a preconstruction air pollution permit application under review.  But this was the president of the BPU speaking publicly – ‘on the record’  – at the time.  He should be accountable for his statements.

Barb Conover