燃媒發電廠煤灰處理引發爭議

Coal consumption is increasing in many parts of the world, driven by skyrocketing energy demands in rapidly developing countries like China. But with coal comes pollution: from climate-changing carbon dioxide to coal ash, the powdery toxic waste left over from burning coal to produce electricity.

在很多經濟快速增長的國家裏，例如中國，由於對能源的需求直線上升，煤炭的消耗量也與日俱增。但是污染問題隨之而來。這些污染物質包括導致氣候變化的二氧化碳，以及發電廠燃燒煤炭後產生的有毒煤灰。

In the United States, coal-fired power plants produce more than 130 million tons of coal waste each year. The debate over how to dispose of it is playing out in the small town of Labadie, Missouri where the controversy is pitting local residents against the Midwestern utility company, Ameren.

在美國，以煤爲燃料的發電廠每年產生1億3千萬噸煤灰。密蘇里州小城鎮拉巴迪正在辯論如何處理這些廢料。辯論的一方是鎮上居民，另一方是中西部的阿莫林電力公司。

It all started with the Labadie ladies book club back in the summer of 2009.

2009年夏天，拉巴迪鎮婦女讀書俱樂部聚會。

"Everybody was just gathering, and somebody kind of off-handedly said, 'Oh, did you all hear that so-and-so just sold his bottom ground,'" says long-time area resident Kay Genovese. "And nobody had heard about that, and she said, 'Yeah, I heard he sold it to Ameren.'"

閒聊時，一位名叫吉諾維斯的會員說起，鎮上某人剛剛把他的一塊低地賣給了阿莫林公司。

Bottom ground is land in the floodplain of the Missouri River. Genovese says at the book club the next month, they found out another farmer had sold his land.

低地指的是指密蘇里河灘上的地。吉諾維斯說，在讀書會下個月的聚會上，知道又有一個農民把他的土地賣掉了。

"And we were like, 'Oh, to Ameren again?' Three months in a row, we kept hearing about these different farmers selling their ground to Ameren."

“我們當時就問：又是賣給阿莫林公司嗎？此後三個月，我們不斷聽說有農民把地賣給阿莫林公司。”

The book club ladies started asking questions. They found out that the utility company Ameren was planning to build a 160 hectare [400 acre] coal ash landfill in the floodplain, next door to its massive power plant in Labadie.

讀書會的女士們開始有了疑問。她們得知，阿莫林電力公司正計劃在拉巴迪鎮這片臨近公司的河灘上，開一個佔地160公頃的煤灰掩埋場。

Shift supervisor Jim Dean says, with its four huge turbines, Labadie can generate enough power to supply electricity to almost half a million homes. To do it, the place burns coal by the train load.

公司當班主管吉姆·狄恩說，拉巴迪工廠這4座巨型渦輪機生產的電力可以供應將近50萬個家庭。爲了達到這個發電量，他們得成車成車地燒煤。

"Each train has about 130 cars in it. Each car holds 100 tons of coal. And we’ll burn one car, 100 tons of coal, in about four minutes with all four units at full load," Dean says.

“每列火車有130節車皮，每節車皮裝100噸煤。我們這4座渦輪機大約每4分鐘就要燒一整車皮、也就是100噸煤。”

At two coal trains a day, that works out to about 10 million tons of coal a year. Approximately seven percent of that - over half a million tons - is left over as coal ash.

每天需要兩列火車的煤炭。一年要燃燒1千萬噸煤。其中大約百分之7、也就是50多噸最後變成了煤灰。阿莫林公司可以回收這50多萬噸煤灰的一半。

Ameren recycles more than half of it. The rest gets mixed with water, and sluiced out to two open ponds next to the plant. The coal ash settles out to the bottom, and the remaining water gets discharged, untreated, into the Missouri River.

另外一半跟水攙在一起，經由閘門進入發電廠附近的兩個池塘。煤灰沉入水底，而未經處理的水則就流入密蘇里河中。

Ameren’s Vice President of Environmental Services, Mike Menne, says those ponds are running out of room. At a 160 hectares, the new landfill would be big enough to replace them both, and take ash from Ameren’s Meramec and Rush Island plants, too.

阿莫林公司主管環保的副總裁邁克·門尼說，這兩個池塘都滿了，新開掘160公頃面積的掩埋場，除了足以取代這兩個池塘之外，還可以收容阿莫林公司在馬雷馬克和拉什島兩處發電廠的煤灰。Menne says the new landfill would have protection systems the current ponds lack. It would be double-lined to protect groundwater, and have a berm around it - about as high as a two-story building - to keep floodwaters out.

門尼說，新的掩埋場將增加現在這兩個池塘沒有的保護系統，比如雙層防滲層，以保護地下水，還有四周兩層樓高的護堤，防止掩埋場內的積水流出。

"And then it has what’s referred to as a leachate collection system which is a water collection system," says Menne. "Any water that would percolate through the material is collected and sent back to the plant to be used for process water."

他說：“另外，還有截留滲水的系統，就和儲水設施一樣，收集滲出的水，送回工廠作爲工業用水。”

Even with all the new safety precautions, many area residents are worried about all that ash, and what’s in it: toxic elements like arsenic, chromium, and lead, which can cause cancer, developmental problems, and other serious health issues.

儘管有這些安全設施，很多當地居民還是擔心煤灰問題。因爲煤灰裏的有毒物質，例如砷、鉻和鉛，會導致癌症、發育不良，和其它嚴重健康問題。

They’re afraid those hazardous substances could wind up in groundwater or the Missouri River, and contaminate area drinking water supplies. They’re also concerned about property values, and increased truck traffic.

他們害怕，這些有害物質會滲入地下水和密蘇里河，污染這個地區的飲水系統。他們還擔心房地產價格因此跌落，以及日益增加的卡車流量。

The Labadie book club ladies, who first found out about Ameren’s landfill plans, got organized, and gave themselves a name - the Labadie Environmental Organization - which now has close to 400 members.

還記得婦女讀書會的女士們嗎？她們已經組織起來，爲讀書會取了名字，叫作“拉巴迪環保組織。”目前這個組織有將近400名成員。

One of them is Labadie resident Petra Haynes. She hopes Ameren will, as she puts it, "do the right thing" and not build a landfill in the floodplain.

成員之一是當地居民裴特拉·海恩斯。她希望阿莫林公司做“正確的事”，而不是在河灘上建掩埋場。

"We really firmly believe that there has to be a better, safer location," she says. "We would like Ameren to really consider the safety and well-being of their customers, rather than the bottom line."

海恩斯說：“我們堅信，一定有一個更好的、更安全的地點做煤灰掩埋場地。我們希望阿莫林公司真正考慮客戶的福利，而不是隻顧公司賺錢。”

She and other area residents have been voicing their concerns at public hearings with the local county board of commissioners. The board is trying to decide whether to change county zoning regulations to allow utility waste landfills like Ameren’s.

海恩斯和其他居民們都在拉巴迪鎮所屬的弗蘭克林縣公聽會上提出了他們的關切。縣政府正在考慮是否改變涉及阿莫林公司等企業掩埋工業廢料的土地區劃法。

Presiding Commissioner John Griesheimer says he understands why people don’t want a landfill in the floodplain.

縣委會主席約翰·格里斯海默說，他了解人們爲什麼不希望在河灘地上建掩埋場。

"But the bottom line is we have to put it somewhere. To be opposed to it, and have an alternative is one thing, but to be just opposed to it without giving us another option here, that’s another matter, and that’s what’s hard for everybody to do."

他說：“問題是總得有一個地方處理廢料。反對這個計劃、並提出一個替代方案是一回事，但是如果只是反對卻又提不出其它選擇，就是另一回事了。這就是大家的難處。”

Griesheimer says a final decision on the county’s landfill regulations is still months away.

格里斯海默說，就縣裏廢料掩埋規定做出最後決定，還要經過幾個月的努力。