The first of four federal EPA public meetings on clean-air concerns will be held Tuesday in Cincinnati. The key issue: The Bush administration's dialogue on whether to weaken requirements of the Clean Air Act, in part to spur expansion of old coal-burning plants.

IF YOU GO

• What: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency public hearings   • When: Tuesday. First session, 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Second session, 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.   • Where: Morning session at the Hyatt Regency Hotel downtown; evening session at the Omni Netherland Hotel.

        That prompted the Sierra Club on Sunday to hold a news conference outside Cinergy's coal-burning Beckjord power plant in Clermont County.

        “I think it's proper to have (the first EPA hearing) here because we're in the middle of ozone alley, some people call it,” said Glen Brand, Sierra Club Midwest associate representative.

        He called Beckjord “the poster child of the problem, dirty coal power plants.”

        Cinergy spokesman Steve Brash on Sunday countered: “In the 1990s, Cinergy invested over $650 million in additional pollution control. And by 2004, we'll invest another $750 million. ... The EPA has studied power-plant emissions and determined they don't have a significant impact on public health.”

        He added that a tentative settlement in a lawsuit would result in an additional $500 million in pollution control measures by 2013.

        In that lawsuit, Cinergy last year settled a complaint by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and others that claimed power plants increased their energy production capacity without adding pollution control.
       

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