Persistence by the local community and environmental groups has paid off in Early County, Georgia: the company that wanted to build a coal plant there has given up.

Press release from GreenLaw, 6 December 2011, Longleaf Defeat Marks End to Nation’s Longest Running Fight Against Coal Plant: Agreement Marks Milestone of 160 Coal Plants Canceled,

The country’s longest-running campaign against construction of a new coal plant ended today as LS Power, a New Jersey-based power company, announced that it will cancel plans to build the Longleaf Energy Station in Blakely, GA. Sierra Club, Friends of the Chattahoochee and GreenLaw have been organizing against the Longleaf coal plant since it was first proposed in 2001. This victory comes as part of a legal agreement between LS Power and Sierra Club.

This victory marks the 160th proposed coal plant canceled since Sierra Club launched its Beyond Coal campaign in 2005. This victory is particularly noteworthy because the struggle lasted for a decade and involved numerous hearings and appeals, and sustained local opposition by hundreds of Georgia residents. Longleaf was one of the very first plants proposed when, in 2001, the coal industry attempted to block clean energy development by building more than 150 new coal plants across the US, a move which would have effectively locked the nation into dependence on coal-fired electricity for the foreseeable future. Longleaf was one of the last remaining new coal projects proposed anywhere in the United States, counting 160 proposals that have now been defeated or abandoned in the past decade.

Several times over the past decade it looked like LS Power would move

forward with its proposed coal plant, but local residents continued their opposition through multiple tactics, including holding a call-in day this past June when more than 250 Georgians called LS Power asking the CEO to cancel the proposal.

“This is not just a victory for the individuals and organizations fighting this plant, but also for all Georgians, who are now safe from a major new source of toxic air pollution,” said Colleen Kiernan, Director of the Georgia Chapter of the Sierra Club. “This victory represents our best work: combining the power of the courts, the power of the people and the power of the press.”

And not just theoretically for all Georgians and beyond:

The announcement comes as part of a nationwide agreement with Sierra Club that also requires LS Power to abandon its proposed Plum Point 2 coal plant in Arkansas and imposes strict new limits on air pollution from the new Sandy Creek coal plant in Texas. The agreement requires the company to withdraw all requests for permits in Georgia and Arkansas, and that any issued permits be rescinded or revoked.

Well done!

And more to do:

Sierra Club, GreenLaw, and several other environmental and public health organizations continue to fight the two remaining coal plant proposals in Georgia proposed by POWER4Georgians in Central and Southeast Georgia. These groups’ work to transition Georgia off of imported coal and onto homegrown clean energy like wind and solar is part of a national effort involving unprecedented collaboration by more than a hundred organizations nationwide. Over the past decade this national campaign has stopped 160 proposed coal plants and secured record investments in clean energy. Since November 2008 only one coal plant has broken ground anywhere in the United States, a highly-subsidized project in Mississippi.

-jsq

PS: Owed to Roy H. Taylor.

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