State Pollution Down, But Coal Plant Pollution Up

HARTFORD (AP) –– Connecticut’s toxic emissions fell six percent between 2000 and 2001, according to a report released Tuesday by the US Environmental Protection Agency.

The state’s largest polluter, however, increased its emissions by 35 percent during that span.

Bridgeport Harbor Station, a coal-burning power plant, pumped nearly 986,000 pounds of toxic chemicals into the environment in 2001, up from 727,000 pounds in 2000.

Bridgeport Harbor Station was responsible for more than one in every three pounds of toxic chemicals released in Connecticut in 2001, the most recent year for which numbers are available.

The plant produced almost twice as much pollution as the state’s next largest polluter, Dow Chemical Co. in the Gales Ferry section of Ledyard.

Wisconsin Energy, which owned the Bridgeport coal plant in 2001, attributed the increase in emissions to a change in the type of coal being burnt.

Officials at Public Service Electric and Gas Co., which purchased the plant last year, said the emissions increase is probably also due to an increase in electricity production.