EPD Says Air Will Be Cleaner When New Coal Plant is Built but Environmental Groups Disagree

The state's top environmental regulator for air pollution says the air in eastern Georgia will be cleaner if and when a coal plant is built near Sandersville in Washington County.

Jac Capp, chief of the state environmental protection division's air protection branch, says the plant also won't add to ozone air pollution in Augusta or Macon. Macon is already near two other coal plants, one of them dubbed by environmental groups as the dirtiest in the U.S.

Coal plants are in the process of reducing pollutant emissions as required by federal and state regulations.

Capp says that the proposed new coal plant, Plant Washington, will also have lower emissions of pollutants.

But environmental groups disagree with Capp's comments. They say the goal of EPD should be to not pollute at all.

Ozone triggers respiratory illnesses. The EPD recently recommended, for the first time, that mid-sized cities in Georgia have failed ozone air pollution standards. Her recommendations are required by federal law and based on measures of the ozone. Newer and tougher restrictions this year have contributed to the cities falling into this category. The federal government will ultimately make the decision on whether the cities, which include Augusta, Macon and Columbus.

The state EPD is beginning the permitting process for Plant Washington. But Capp and his staff have already reviewed an extensive proposal for the plant.

Hear audio about Plant Washington:

Jac Capp, Georgia Environmental Protection Division

Powered by Podbean.com

Powered by Podbean.com

Midge Sweet, Georgians for Smart Energy

Powered by Podbean.com

Group wants more testing on Superfund site

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says, an elementary school located near a federal Superfund site in Brunswick is safe, but a local environmental group isn’t so sure.

Altama Elementary sits next to one of the nation’s largest toxic cleanups. The contaminated Hercules Landfill has been tested for years.

Now the E.P.A. and local environmentalists disagree over whether more tests are needed. Daniel Parshley of the Glynn Environmental Coalition says even the E.P.A. admits it used the wrong method to test for a potentially dangerous chemical at the site.

“We requested that the E.P.A. undertake this testing and received a response in May that they did not intend to do any further sampling,” says Parsley. “We hope the school is safe. But we need facts and not hope.”

An E.P.A spokesman says, no further tests are needed because the school is safe. The Glynn County School Board is considering whether to join the environmental group in its call for a proper testing method to be used at the school.

Ex-EPA scientist fights agency over sewage sludge

David Lewis is a lab rat with no lab, a researcher with no salary, a once-influential scientist whose only perk these days is a lonely cubbyhole.

In his heyday, he was a high-ranking Environmental Protection Agency scientist whose discovery that dental equipment could be a haven for the HIV virus in the 1990s earned him prestige and respect.

Now he's a pariah, working out of a spare office at the University of Georgia and waging a quixotic battle with his former patron over sewage sludge, the reason for his gradual fall from grace.

More than a decade ago, Lewis began to challenge the EPA's policy allowing farmers to spread the semi-solid byproduct of wastewater treatment plants over their fields as a free, nutrient-rich fertilizer.

He's investigated illnesses and deaths he claims are linked to the sludge; he said his work has helped prod government officials to issue guidelines for workers who handle the sludge. He's also filed a flurry of lawsuits, the latest in March 2006 claiming UGA was complicit in a scheme by EPA leaders to justify the agency's program that distributes sludge to farm fields.

"Science is getting trumped by politics and I want that fixed," said Lewis. "My case is the worst case scenario where politics is blocking good science."

There was more than a hint of a conspiratorial tone in his voice recently when he said he's up against "an effort organized by multiple federal agencies and powerful industry groups with support of tens of millions of dollars in congressional earmarks."

The UGA and EPA researchers have stood by their work and deny wrongdoing.

"There's no cover-up. There's no conspiracy," said Robert Brobst, an EPA environmental engineer and a defendant in the lawsuit. "We're a bunch of nerdy scientists. How the hell do we know how to cover up and do conspiracies? We're boring."

For Lewis, who said he's trying to reclaim his reputation, it's been a costly crusade. He's lost his job with the EPA and was spurned by UGA, where he once hoped to land a gig as a tenured professor.

But he has reason to be encouraged. A federal judge has refused to throw out Lewis' lawsuit against UGA, and his work is helping focus attention on sewage sludge beyond the small circle of scientists who now study it.

"There really has not been adequate research about what this material is, let alone the repercussions," said Rob Hale, an environmental chemistry professor at the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences. "Folks were told that this stuff had been studied to death, and Lewis is concerned that they're overstating what they knew about the material."

Wastewater treatment plants across the nation produce about 7 million tons of the sludge each year as a byproduct, and slightly more than half of it is used as fertilizer. The EPA has long argued the sludge is safe as long as it's applied properly.

"If it's misused, if it's overapplied, if it doesn't meet quality criteria, of course it's going to be a problem," said Brobst, who has specialized in this area for 30 years.

Still, "Based on what we know today, yes, it's safe," he said. "Science takes little steps, but if you add up all the little pieces in 1,500 articles in the last five years, you have a safe argument."

Lewis, who was never shy to question EPA policies, turned his attention to sewage sludge in 1996 after the issue kept coming up during an informal poll of his colleagues.

He started collecting samples from sewage treatment plants, using some of the same methods he used while investigating dental products: Collecting gunk and analyzing it for harmful pathogens and toxic materials. He soon found some that certain pathogens in the sludge could survive disinfection by taking shelter in fatty greases and oils.

"It doesn't take but a high school education in science to understand this stuff: Bacteria hides in hunks of gunk," he said.

He presented his findings at a national conference in 1998, prompting a new round of media coverage - and more scrutiny from his employer. Other EPA researchers soon conducted a study that refuted some of his work, though Lewis has questioned their methodology.

Lewis' growing reputation didn't do him any favors with his bosses, who offered in 1998 to pay his salary at UGA for four years as long as he retired after the contract was up. At UGA, though, he said he wasn't granted the freedom he had hoped, and started conducting research on his own dime. UGA never did offer him a job, and when his EPA contract was up, Lewis refused to retire and was let go in 2003.

Since then, he's turned his full attention toward fighting his former employers in court, where he's had a few successes and some stinging defeats, such as a 2004 administrative judge ruling that said Lewis has not provided "scientific evidence to back up his belief" that the sludge could pose a significant danger to people.

On the walls of Lewis' modest home in Watkinsville are some of the proudest images of his career, and in his office is a silver cabinet full of sludge files.

To Lewis, they are a constant reminder of the score he still wants to settle. And to some of his colleagues, that's not such a far-fetched idea.

"He's got a lot of guts and fortitude, and he's been right in the past," said Hale. "You need people like that, whether you agree with him or not."

(The Associated Press)

Click here for more GPB News coverage of environmental issues.

Chattahoochee River Water funding dries up

Chattahoochee River between Columbus and Phenix, Ala. (Dave Bender)

Georgia environmental groups - like many non-profit organizations - are feeling the economic pinch. One organization sharply curtailing its activities is Columbus-based Chattahoochee River Watch.

The group's $100, 000 annual operating budget goes towards monitoring pollutants and silt along the river, and in the creeks and steams that feed it.

But that money is drying up, because donations are way down.

Bill Edwards was the group's salaried executive director and now serves as chief volunteer:

"With the cutback in funding, Chattahoochee RiverWatch is going to have to sit down and reprioritize what it's going to do and how it's going to raise the money to do it."

Edwards says the group will severely cutback it's operation but hopes to resume activities in the spring or summer - depending on funding.

Officials with other environmental groups report similar shortfalls in donations since the economic downturn.

Click here for more GPB News environmental coverage.

Environmental official resigns

The chief of the Georgia Environmental Protection Division's Air Protection Branch, has resigned. The branch is responsible for protecting Georgia's air quality through the regulation of emissions from industrial and mobile sources. Heather Abrams will join the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's regional office in Atlanta.

Army seen backing Ft. Benning armor center eco-study

An environmental study on constructing armor school facilities at Ft. Benning, that would bring a major influx of military personnel to the area has been released to the public.

The study, part of the military's Base Realignment and Closure Commission's recommendations include relocating the Army's armor center, currently based at Ft. Knox, Kentucky.

An estimated 30,000 troops and family, civilian employees and contractors would be relocated to the Columbus area.

Linda Veenstra, environmental counsel for Ft. Benning's Judge Advocate's office says that while the project would cause some negative impact, the army was taking steps to limit the damage.

“We've tried to avoid areas that we know have important resources on them, whether it be federally listed species or wetlands, or historic properties such as archaeological sites.”

Construction could start late this summer, pending army approval, base commander Maj. Gen. Walt Wojdakowski told the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer newspaper.

The Department of the Army, however, has yet to officially approve the Environmental Impact Statement document.

A public discussion on the study is set for May 10 at the Columbus Convention & Trade Center, and copies are available at several local libraries and online.

Olin Corporation mercury remediation plan drawing controversy

Environmental groups in Georgia worry that a plan to contain mercury at a chemical plant might be dangerous.

Olin Corporation in Augusta uses mercury to produce chlorine.

Mercury is toxic, especially to a fetus.

Company officials say it's in the sediment of a drainage canal at the plant.

In an effort to contain the mercury, they want to cover the canal with a special plastic material, soil and grass, and close the mouth of the canal with a double steel sheet piled wall.

They then want to use an existing pipe to discharge wastewater with mercury into the Savannah River.

But some environmental groups worry that the plan would only shift contamination to sediment in the river, making the situation worse.

"The microorganisms in the sediments convert that mercury to methyl mercury...The methyl mercury works its way up the food chain...and it contaminates the fish...so eating the fish is the problem," said Frank Carl, director of the Savannah Riverkeeper.

Olin says it plans to discharge only a third of what the federal government considers a safe level of mercury.

The Georgia Environmental Protection Division is reviewing Olin's mercury remediation plan, which a company offcial say is voluntary.

Officials say chemical plant in Augusta underreported emissions

An east Georgia chemical manufacturer has underreported emissions, according to state officials.

And, they say, the chemical company has acknowledged there is an inaccuracy.

The chemical is called cyclohexane. While it does not pose direct health risks, large amounts can contribute to smog.

The company is DSM Chemicals North America, a chemical manufacturer based in Augusta. Officials with the Georgia Environmental Protection Division say DSM underreported emissions of the chemical by ten times. They say this occurred over a three year period.

DSM uses cyclohexane to produce another chemical used to make nylon.

EPD officials say calculations used as an indicator to determine emissions of cyclohexane were incorrect.

They also say the company determined an emissions recovery system was inefficient.

DSM executives were unavailable for comment. They have, however, acknowledged to state environmental officials that the initial reports were inaccurate, says the EPD. State and federal environmental officials will now review what measures or fines may be levied against the company.

Report says Georgia power plants - the dirtiest

Some of the dirtiest power plants in the nation are right here in Georgia.

A report by the Environmental Integrity Project ranked Georgia Power's Plant Scherer north of Macon #1 in the country for carbon dioxide emissions. Georgia Power also owns the largest emitter of sulfur dioxide for the second year in a row, Plant Bowen north of Atlanta.

Georgia Power spokesperson Lynn Wallace said the company is on its way to clean up its plants.

"Georgia Power will be investing more than 2 billion dollars over the next three years to install additional environmental controls at its largest coal plants including Plant Bowen and Plant Scherer," said Wallace.

However, she also said there's no known technology in place to reduce CO2 emissions.

The Environmental Protection Agency established a 2010 deadline for power companies to meet air quality standards.

Plant Vogtle in Waynesboro gets favorable response on proposed new nuclear reactors

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has found that there are no environmental impacts that would prevent Southern Nuclear Operating Co., a part of Southern Company, from getting an early site permit to construct two new nuclear reactors in eastern Georgia.

It's a preliminary, but important, step in the lengthy approval process for Plant Vogtle in Waynesboro.

Environmental and safety evaluations of the proposed construction site are conducted throughout the early site permit process.

Southern Nuclear must also get a construction and operating license to build.

That decision likely won't happen until 2009.

Environmental groups, meanwhile, argue the new reactors would use too much water from the Savannah River, something that Southern Nuclear denies.

The groups also fear a nuclear accident.

Southern Nuclear has said it has not committed to building the reactors, even though it's pursuing the permit and license.

The reactors would generate electricity for Georgia Power customers.

Environmental groups go to court over pulp mill discharges into Altamaha River

An environmental group is going to court to force a pulp mill to clean up its discharges into a river in eastern Georgia.

But the mill says it's already taking steps to do just that.

Attorneys for Greenlaw say the discharges from the Rayonier pulp mill into the Altamaha River in Jesup smell bad and are very dark in color.

They say they'll sue the company in federal court if it does not clean up its effluent in 60 days.

"How much light going in and out of the river...can impact aquatic life. There's also chemicals associated with discharges that can cause problems," says Justine Thompson, the director of Greenlaw.

Thompson accuses the company of violating the federal Clean Water Act.

But Mike Bell, a spokesman at Rayonier, denies that.

"The Georgia Environmental Protection Division, which is in charge of enforcing state and federal standards in water quality has found no such allegation," says Bell.

But the EPD does want Rayonier to reduce the color of the effluent.

So the company is implementing millions of dollars in technology to clean up the discharge within the next seven years, says Bell.

A spokeswoman for the Altamaha Riverkeeper, meanwhile, disagrees with the plan, saying it does not go far enough and will take too long to complete.

Drought Decision Wednesday

Encouraged by the replenishing rains, state environmental officials are set to decide Wednesday whether to relax water restrictions that banned most outdoor water use across north Georgia.

Just a year ago, about 60 percent of the state was locked in some sort of drought.

Federal forecasters now say the state has completely emerged from the drought, and that only a small pocket in northeast Georgia remains "abnormally dry."

Still, conservationists are concerned that if the state Drought Response Committee decides to ease or lift restrictions it will send the wrong message to water-conscious residents.

As the drought spread in late 2007, state environmental officials banned virtually all outdoor watering in the northern part of the state and ordered utilities in the area to reduce water use by 10 percent.

The requirements for the utilities were lifted as the drought began to ease, and state officials agreed to allow some counties that do not rely on Lake Lanier to get exemptions from some of the restrictions.

Georgia environmental officials have since allowed residents to fill outdoor swimming pools, hand-water plants for 25 minutes three days a week and use drip irrigation and soaker houses to maintain their yards.

Yet an order that bans most other outdoor watering across north Georgia and limits outdoor watering to three days a week throughout the rest of the state are still in place.

Judge's ruling halts planned power station (Updated)

In a landmark ruling with national implications, The Fulton County Superior Court today reversed a previous administrative court decision on an Environmental Protection Division (EPD) permit allowing the construction of a coal-fired power plant in southwest Georgia.

"We are in a moment of elation," said Justine Thompson a lawyer for Greenlaw, who represent a coalition of local residents and environmental groups that are fighting the plant's construction.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thelma Wyatt Cummings Moore reversed a previous decision by Atlanta Administrative Law Judge Judge Stephanie Howells, giving the go-ahead for the project.

Wyatt said in her ruling regarding the plant's projected carbon dioxide emissions:

"Faced with the ruling in Massachusetts that CO2 is an “air pollutant” under the Act, Respondents are forced to argue that CO2 is still not a “pollutant subject to regulation under the Act.” Respondents’ position is untenable. Putting aside the argument that any substance that falls within the statutory definition of “air pollutant may be “subject to” regulation under the Act, there is no question that CO2 is “subject to regulation under the Act."

Howells, in an 108-page decision reached on January 11th, had ruled affirming the EPD decision to issue an air quality permit:

"...the weight of the evidence demonstrates that limits imposed by EPD are reasonable and supported by law.”

The Houston-based Dynegy Company wants to build the 1200-megawatt Longleaf power plant on the Chattahoochee River in Early County.

The opponents last year filed an appeal to stop the construction. The say the plant would emit unchecked levels of carbon dioxide, and unacceptable amounts of other pollutants.

Proponents say the 1.2-billion dollar project will provide hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars in tax revenue for the poor rural area.

The plant would be the first such facility to be built in Georgia in the last 20-years.

Environmentalists said the decision marks the first time that a judge has applied a U.S. Supreme Court finding that carbon dioxide is a pollutant to emissions from an industrial source.

The court's April 2007 decision said the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, which are blamed for global warming.

"We will be taking this decision and making the same arguments to push for an end to conventional coal," said Bruce Nilles, who oversees the Sierra Club's National Coal Campaign.

The plant's developers, LS Power and Dynegy Inc., said they planned to appeal.

"We are surprised with Judge Moore's ruling against us in every respect," said Mike Vogt, a spokesman for the energy plant. He also downplayed the ruling's impact on other pending lawsuits.

"I don't know what type of legal precedent a superior court judge in one state has over judges in other states," he said.

At a June 3 hearing, lawyers representing state regulators and plant developers said there was no federal standard yet to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and warned that a ruling to regulate the gas would "short-circuit" legislators' work to develop new rules.

The plant is expected to create more than 100 full-time jobs and give millions of dollars in tax revenues to Early County, where almost a quarter of the 12,000 residents live in poverty. It would power more than a half-million homes through utilities in Georgia, Alabama and Florida.

Each year it would emit as much as 9 million tons of carbon dioxide, worrying critics who say it could cause health problems in a county that already suffers above-average air pollution.

The decision will force state regulators to reconsider coal-fired power plants and could push state regulators toward cleaner and more efficient energy, said Patti Durand, director of the Sierra Club's Georgia chapter.

"It's a scandal that energy companies are still trying to build coal plants even though they cause global warming," she said. "I can't be more thrilled. It's a huge ruling. This is a new day in the United States, and I'm thrilled."

Click here for more GPB News coverage about the Longleaf power station.

(With The Associated Press)

Environmental groups lose challenge

Federal appeals judges are upholding the Environmental Protection Agency's refusal to take away state pollution permits for two Georgia Power coal-fired generating plants. The Sierra Club and the Coosa River Basin Initiative were suing to stop permits for Plant Bowen in northwest Georgia and Plant Scherer just north of Macon. They argued the plants violate the Clean Air Act. This recent ruling upholds a previous judge's ruling that that environmental groups had not proved the permits fail to enforce the law, even though the EPA issued a violation notice against the plants in 1999.

Marina dispute could affect coastal growth

Michael DeMell, environmental consultant to Cumberland Harbour development, stands on a newly constructed dock that comes off a deep water lot in St. Marys, Ga. The marina and housing development takes up part of a peninsula frequented by northern right whales. (Stephen Morton / AP file)

A legal fight over whether the law protecting Georgia marshlands can extend to residential developments on dry land is headed to the state Supreme Court, which could set a precedent imposing tougher standards on construction near salt marshes along Georgia's 100-mile coast.

The court will hear arguments Monday in a dispute between environmentalists and the developer of Cumberland Harbour, a 1,014-acre gated subdivision built on a peninsula surrounded by marsh in Camden County near the Georgia-Florida border.

The developer, the Land Resource Companies, was granted a state permit in 2005 to build two marinas and three community docks at Cumberland Harbour. They would make up the largest marina complex in Georgia with more than 17,500 linear feet of floating docks.

View Larger Map

Opponents have tied up the project in court ever since, arguing state regulators granted the marina permit without considering potential harm to the marsh from polluting stormwater runoff from the entire development - including homes built on the peninsula's uplands.

It will be the first time the state Supreme Court has considered whether development on land, rather than in the marsh itself, is covered by safeguards in the Coastal Marshlands Protection Act. The regulatory committee that issues permits says it lacks that authority under the law.

"It's a big deal because there's been a wholesale failure of government to protect the marsh other than to keep it from being filled in," said Gordon Rogers, the Satilla riverkeeper and one of the plaintiffs in the case. "The act is broader than how they're using it."

The 1970 state law was passed to protect Georgia's 378,000 acres of marshland, about a third of the total on the East Coast, from destruction. Salt marshes serve as wildlife habitat, help shield coastlines against flooding and erosion, and feed marine animals miles offshore with their decaying grasses.

The law requires a regulatory permit for any development "on or over marshlands." Attorneys for Land Resource, as well as Georgia's attorney general, say the only upland construction the law has been applied to are portions of marinas such as fuel tanks, storage buildings and parking lots.

"We are confident in the correctness of our legal argument that (the law) was not intended to and does not regulate the uplands residential development at Cumberland Harbour," said Patricia Barmeyer, an attorney for the developer.

Part of the area to be developed. (Courtesy Livesouth.com)

One of the law's authors, former state Rep. Reid W. Harris of St. Simons Island, also insists it would be a stretch to apply the marshlands act to homes on dry land. Harris, a retired lawyer, filed a brief with the Supreme Court saying the law wouldn't have passed had legislators feared it would restrict private property rights.

Stephen O'Day, an attorney working on the case with the Southern Environmental Law Center, argues the marinas are an integral piece of the overall Cumberland Harbour subdivision.

O'Day points to ponds on the property designed to collect stormwater runoff from all parts of the development - including the marinas. The ponds then filter out pollutants before piping the water back onto land. Some of that stormwater, O'Day says, will flow into the marsh. But how much comes from the marinas?

"You can't separate out the stormwater discharge from the marina and other stormwater discharge from the project," O'Day said. "It's all one stormwater system."

He also notes the Marshlands Protection Act gives state regulators power over any activity that would drain, fill in "or otherwise alter" Georgia marshlands. Because stormwater runoff can upset the delicate salinity balance of salt marshes, O'Day says, it should be considered an alteration.

Other Georgia developers and coastal landowners are watching the case.

The Sea Island Company, the Georgia-based owner and developer of coastal luxury resorts, says applying the marshlands act to upland development would be "grossly onerous and unfair" to property owners.

"The impact of this would be staggering," a Sea Island attorney wrote in a brief filed with the Supreme Court, saying the state would become "regulators of land-disturbing activities on hundreds of thousands if not millions of acres in Georgia's coastal region."

The Cumberland Harbour marina proposals stirred controversy not just because of their size, but also because of their location.

The marinas would launch hundreds of pleasure boats in waters within two miles of federally protected Cumberland Island. Endangered right whales migrate to those waters every winter to birth their calves. Researchers believe only 300 to 350 of the rare whales still exist, and collisions with ships and boats is their No. 1 killer.

An administrative law judge in 2006 sent the Cumberland Harbour marina permit back to state regulators, saying they hadn't properly assessed the threat to right whales and other protected species such as manatees and sea turtles. The judge also ruled regulators had to consider the impact of the "entire project" on the marsh, including upland homes.

Last year, the Georgia Court of Appeals unanimously reversed the lower court on the residential construction issue, saying that interpretation was too broad. One of the judges urged legislators to expand the scope of the law.

The Supreme Court's ruling won't be the final word on whether Cumberland Harbour can build its marinas. Regardless of the outcome, regulators will still have to settle issues related to protected species from the 2006 judicial ruling.

Click here for more GPB News coverage of statewide environmental issues.

(The Associated Press)

Coal power plant construction challenged in court

Environmental groups and a power company will clash in court today over a coal-fired power plant that could be built in southwest Georgia’s Early County.

Environmentalists ask the judge to reconsider the state’s decision to issue an air pollution permit to the power company. They say the permit doesn’t regulate the plant’s carbon dioxide emissions.

The majority of scientists say carbon dioxide is the leading cause of global warming.

The case is among the first challenges against coal-fired plants filed since the Supreme Court’s April 2007 ruling that carbon dioxide could be regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency.

11th Hour PFOA Advisory Issued by Bush Administration

Before leaving office, Bush administration officials issued a first-ever advisory on how much PFOA, a likely carcinogen, should be in drinking water.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says drinking water should contain only .4 parts per-billion of PFOA.The likely carcinogen has been found in concentrations as high as five-parts per-billion in Northwest Georgia's Conasauga River, a drinking water source to Rome and other communities.

The chemical compound gets in the river from a spray field operated by energy provider Dalton Utilities.The advisory, however, is not mandatory and Dalton Utilities says, it won't take any action on it until told to do so by the company's permitting authority, the state Environmental Protection Division.

So far, the EPD hasn't commented on the federal advisory, a first of its kind. Other states, including Minnesota, have put even stricter limits on PFOA, measuring its acceptable levles in parts per trillion.

For all of GPB's coverage of PFOA in the Conasauga, log onto:
http://www.gpb.org/georgiagazette/conasauga

Legislative hearing: "Climate change: fact or fiction?"

A House committee is drawing proponents and skeptics together for a knock-out debate over whether climate change is really happening. They are calling the hearing "Climate change: fact or fiction?"

Energy Committee Chairman Jeff Lewis (R-White) says the matter is far from clear. He thinks other states in the Northwest and the Northeast may be crippling their economies by setting policies to counteract climate change.

"They're setting policy based on what is probably a limited scientific theory," White says. "We want to make sure that if and when the time comes for the state of Georgia to enact--whether it's energy policy, environmental policy, or manufacturing and economic development policies--that it is based on real science and not so-called 'junk' science."

Meanwhile, environmental groups are up in arms. They have sent e-mails to their members and journalists telling them that climate change is, indeed, fact, and not fiction.

Marsh ruling backs developer

The state Court of Appeals has delivered a setback to environmental groups who argued for a broad interpretation of a state law protecting coastal marshes. The unanimous ruling says, the Coastal Marshlands Protection Act does not apply to residential developments on land above the marsh.

The ruling is a disappointment to enviornmental groups, who argued the law does apply, since run-off from upland development is harmful to rare species and salt marshes along the state's 1-hundred-mile coastline. The developer whose project sparked the case, Mark Flasky, says he's grateful Cumberland Habor seems back on track.

The project is 1-thousand-acres across the marsh from Cumberland Island. Officials at the Southern Environmental Law Center, a lead plaintiff in the case, say they might appeal the ruling to the state Supreme Court.

Water war study held up by Congress

Georgia's top environmental official says the three states battling over water shouldn't wait for Congress to pay for a study. Instead, Environmental Protection Division Director Carol Couch, says Georgia, Florida, and Alabama should pay for it. The three states have been fighting over water-sharing for decades. Officials believe an independent study of the waterways could help resolve the dispute.