Alcoa urged to clean up brown coal station

Alex de Vos
Environmentalists have urged Alcoa to clean up its Anglesea power station amid fears of rising carbon dioxide emissions.
But the aluminum giant said it had no plans to clean up its brown-coal-fired plant at Anglesea.
Geelong Environment Council’s Joan Lindros said the group had “great concerns” about the station.
“They’re planning to expand into the areas of the Anglesea Heathland and once it’s destroyed it’s irreplaceable,” Ms Lindros said.
“It’s very disturbing.”
Ms Lindros urged Alcoa to improve its technology to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
“Every coal station should start using clean-coal technologies,” she said.
“The environment is really going to suffer if they don’t do anything soon.”
But an Alcoa spokesperson said the company was under no requirement to clean up the power station.
“There is nothing in our licence about using clean coal technologies,” the spokesperson said.
“We’re not regulated on carbon dioxide emissions.”
Alcoa’s Anglesea power station supplies about 40 per cent of the electricity used at the company’s Point Henry aluminum smelter.
Alcoa fuels the plant with brown coal from a nearby open-cut mine, transported to the power station along a thee-kilometre private road.
The spokesperson said Alcoa’s lease agreement permitted the company to explore the Anglesea Heathland for brown coal.
“The lease extends from 1961 to 2011, with an opportunity to extend the lease until 2061,” the spokesperson said.
Ms Lindros issued her clean-up call after Prime Minister Kevin Rudd last year ratified the Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Mr Rudd said Federal Government would do everything in its power to help Australia meets it Kyoto obligations, including setting a new target of a 60 per cent reduction in emissions by 2050.
The government would also establish a national emissions trading scheme by 2010 and a 20 per cent target for renewable energy by 2020.