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April 23-April 29, 2021
ALSO COVERING ELMHURST, JACKSON HEIGHTS, LONG ISLAND CITY, MASPETH, MIDDLE VILLAGE, REGO PARK, SUNNYSIDE
Mayor comes out against Astoria peaker plant
proposal, claims it will ‘take us backwards’
BY ANGÉLICA ACEVEDO
Mayor Bill de Blasio announced
he is against the
proposed Astoria power plant
during a press conference on
Monday, April 19.
De Blasio made the announcement
as he spoke about
Earth week, saying the city will
be talking about how it’s addressing
climate change during
the week ahead of Earth Day on
Thursday, April 22.
“Today, I’m taking a stand,
formerly, against two fossil fuel
plants — the two peaker plants,
they’re called — that have been
proposed in Astoria and Gowanus,”
de Blasio said. “These
are plants that would be run
on fracked gas, they are plants
that would take us backwards,
not forwards. They are plants
that would unfortunately place
us in that past of fossil fuels
dependency and hold us back.
They should not be allowed to go
forward.”
The mayor said the issues
are not only about fighting climate
change, but also about climate
justice.
“When fossil fuels are
burned there is a horrible
impact on communities, especially
lower-income communities
have suffered. Kids
have suffered with asthma,”
de Blasio said. “We gotta move
off fossil fuels consistently,
purposefully, intentionally, in
Mayor Bill de Blasio said he is “taking a stand” against the proposed Astoria peaker plant.
Photo via Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Offi ce
every way we can.”
De Blasio reiterated that the
city is committed to expanding
the use of renewable energy
and breaking the dependency
on fossil fuels. He added that
it’s important to listen to the
climate justice movement, especially
led by young people, to
put communities first.
The mayor is the latest elected
official to come out against
a proposal, dubbed the Astoria
Replacement Project, by NRG
Energy, a large fossil fuel company,
to build a new peaker
plant in Astoria. NRG wants to
replace and upgrade their exiting
generators with natural gasfired
power, saying they’ll keep
it a peaking facility but will add
new technology that would provide
clean air benefits.
Peaker plants operate when
there’s a high demand in electricity
by burning fossil fuels
that emit harmful air pollutants
into the air.
Nearly all of the elected officials
who represent Astoria and
much of western Queens have
fervently opposed the plan for
months.
This month, city and state
elected officials from across the
city sent a letter to Gov. Andrew
Cuomo and the Department of
Environmental Conservation
(DEC) asking he deny NRG’s permits
to construct the new plant.
In their letter, the lawmakers
said that the plan doesn’t align
with the state’s Climate Leadership
and Community Protection
Act (CLCPA).
In response to the mayor’s
announcement, Tom Atkins,
vice president of Development
at NRG, said the new plant will
create hundreds of jobs, reduce
greenhouse gas emissions statewide
making it compliant with
the CLCPA and could be converted
to carbon-free hydrogen
in the future.
“As New York transitions to
renewable energy, New Yorkers
deserve an opportunity to have
cleaner air now. New Yorkers
don’t need to choose between
modern backup electricity
plants like our Astoria Replacement
Project and renewable
energy. New York needs both,”
Atkins stated. “New York City
cannot afford to be shortsighted
and ignore the lessons learned
last summer in California and
just two months ago in Texas.
All credible third-party studies
show highly efficient projects
using lower-emitting fuels like
natural gas are a critical component
to reliably transition to a
greener grid.”
Elected officials and advocates
are particularly concerned
that NRG has bypassed
a full public review of their new
proposal and has “fast-tracked”
approvals from the statedue to
approval they received for a different
plan in 2010.
A DEC spokesperson said
that prior to any final decision
on NRG’s Astoria proposal, the
agency is undertaking a full environmental
review “to ensure
protection of public health and
the environment,” including
an assessment of the project’s
consistency with the CLCPA.
Reach reporter Angélica
Acevedo by e-mail at aacevedo@
schnepsmedia.com
Vol. 9 No. 17 40 total pages
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