State Commission Considers Century Farm Annex to Waterloo Coal Plant

[Video] In 1930, Merle Bell was born in the same house where his grandparents died, on the same farm, the same 40 acres where he and his family, as he puts it, “sustained,” themselves through the Great Depression.

It’s also the same acreage that the city of Waterloo may annex to build a 750-megawatt coal plant. 

Bell’s farm is part of a 345-acre site that is being called a “flagpole annex” by some for the strange serpentine shape of the new section of Waterloo’s city limits.

Video interview with Merle Bell is available below the fold.On Sept. 12, the governor-appointed City Development Board (CDB) will review a proposal to take not just Bell’s property but bits and pieces of his neighbors’ too.

A few of Bell’s neighbors have agreed to sell and move on, hoping to find new life in a fresh setting.  They are voluntary “consenting land owners.” 

The city of Waterloo unanimously approved rezoning of the agricultural sites in May 2007.  But because the annexation proposal lacks full consent of all land-owners, it will require the approval of 4 out of the 5 CDB commissioners to pass.

Merle Bell is the only non-consenting land owner.  In this 3-minute video, he talks about the history of his farm.

The land is being pursued by New Jersey-based company, LS Power, one of the leading power plant builders in the United States.  Being undeterred by market rumors of carbon emissions fees, they have 12 coal plants under development across the country among a flurry of energy projects, including wind, natural gas and some bio-mass. 

LS Power, owner of Elk Run Energy, projects that the Elk Run Energy Station will cost more than $1.3 billion and be completed by 2012. 

“The money invested in this facility could instead be used for energy efficiency and renewable energy for customers across the region — that would create more jobs than the coal plant and stabilize energy bills,” says Mark Kresowik, conservation organizer with the Iowa Sierra Club, one of the groups that opposes construction of the plant.

Mark Millburn of Elk Run Energy in St. Louis, Mo., says one area of renewable energy was off-limits to his company.

“The thing about wind in Iowa is that there’s a lot of developers already in Iowa working on wind that are way ahead of us…And there is a need for that, but there’s an even greater need for ‘base-load’ energy, and that’s why we’re proposing the project.”

Elk Run Energy Station does call for a bio-mass component that won’t ever exceed 10% percent of the total output.  Further bio-mass details remain to be worked out.

Millburn did mention state legislation that was considered and would have mandated his plant to have specific amounts of renewable energy as part of his project.  He said legislation like this was “anti-competition” and not fair to LS Power.

Senate File 544 was passed 48-0 by the Iowa Senate earlier this year.  At which point Kresowik says the legislation “was gutted by the House Commerce Committee on April 5.  The bill was passed out of committee after removing language about merchant coal plants.”

Kresowik says that Senate File 544 originally “promoted renewable energy and energy efficiency instead of this plant.”

LS Power projects that the Elk Run Energy Station will employ around 100 workers when finished.

Merle Bell is hosting a rally to save his farm and stop the coal plant on Sept. 9 at 4 p.m.  His place is located east of Waterloo between Raymond Road and Elk Run Road on Newell Street.