Local air quality still hard to determine
By Nick Tabor, New Era Senior Staff Writer
Kentucky ranks 10th in
the nation for releasing toxic chemicals into the environment.
However,
this ranking shouldn’t worry Christian
County residents about
the quality of the local air, as the state’s worst offenders, by and large, are
power plants.
The
nearest power plants to here are the Lake Barkley Power Plant and the Paradise
Fossil Plant in Muhlenberg
County.
Earlier
this month, the National
Resources Defense
Center named this state’s
power plants the worst in the country for exposing residents to toxic air
pollution.
For
the toxic chemicals Kentucky
releases in highest quantities — sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid — power
plants dominate the list of worst culprits.
Three
Kentucky counties that have power plants —
Carroll, Jefferson and Muhlenberg — rank among the top 50 counties in the U.S. for the
pollution they produce.
Christian County, on the other hand, is nowhere
near the top of the list.
