Harding Street Station

Harding Street Station (also known as E.W. Stout Generating Station) is a coal-fired power station owned and operated by AES in Indianapolis, Indiana.

In May 2013, IPL announced that the Eagle Valley Station will be retired, with a 650 MW combined cycle gas plant to be constructed at the same site by 2017. At the same time IPL announced plans to refuel two of the three coal-fired Harding units to gas by April 2016 (Units 5 and 6, but not Unit 7).

Plant Data

 * Owner: Indianapolis Power & Light Company
 * Parent Company: AES
 * Plant Nameplate Capacity: 698 MW (Megawatts)
 * Units and In-Service Dates: unit 5: 114 MW (1958), unit 6: 114 MW (1961), unit 7: 471 MW (1973)
 * Location: 3700 South Harding St., Indianapolis, IN 46217
 * GPS Coordinates: 39.710444, -86.1955
 * Coal Consumption:
 * Coal Source:
 * Number of Employees:

Emissions Data

 * 2006 CO2 Emissions: 3,941,524 tons
 * 2006 SO2 Emissions: 46,346 tons
 * 2006 SO2 Emissions per MWh:
 * 2006 NOx Emissions: 4,336 tons
 * 2005 Mercury Emissions: 131 lb.

Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Harding Street
In 2010, Abt Associates issued a study commissioned by the Clean Air Task Force, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, quantifying the deaths and other health effects attributable to fine particle pollution from coal-fired power plants. Fine particle pollution consists of a complex mixture of soot, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. Among these particles, the most dangerous are those less than 2.5 microns in diameter, which are so tiny that they can evade the lung's natural defenses, enter the bloodstream, and be transported to vital organs. Impacts are especially severe among the elderly, children, and those with respiratory disease. The study found that over 13,000 deaths and tens of thousands of cases of chronic bronchitis, acute bronchitis, asthma, congestive heart failure, acute myocardial infarction, dysrhythmia, ischemic heart disease, chronic lung disease, and pneumonia each year are attributable to fine particle pollution from U.S. coal plant emissions. These deaths and illnesses are major examples of coal's external costs, i.e. uncompensated harms inflicted upon the public at large. Low-income and minority populations are disproportionately impacted as well, due to the tendency of companies to avoid locating power plants upwind of affluent communities. To monetize the health impact of fine particle pollution from each coal plant, Abt assigned a value of $7,300,000 to each 2010 mortality, based on a range of government and private studies. Valuations of illnesses ranged from $52 for an asthma episode to $440,000 for a case of chronic bronchitis.

Table 1: Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Harding Street Station
Source: "Find Your Risk from Power Plant Pollution," Clean Air Task Force interactive table, accessed March 2011

Coal Waste Sites

 * Harding Street Station Pond 1
 * Harding Street Station Pond 2
 * Harding Street Station Pond 3
 * Harding Street Station Pond 4
 * Harding Street Station Ponds 2A/2B

EPA "high hazard" dam
In November 2011, the EPA released a new set of coal waste data that revealed 181 “significant” hazard dams in 18 states - more than three times the 60 significant-hazard ponds listed in the original database released in 2009. In addition to the increase in the number of significant hazard-rated ponds, eight previously unrated coal ash ponds were found to be high hazard ponds in information released by the EPA earlier in 2011. Because of the switch in ratings after the EPA inspections, the total number of high hazard ponds has stayed roughly the same at a total of 47 ponds nationwide.

According to the National Inventory of Dams (NID) criteria, “high” hazard coal ash ponds are categorized as such because their failure will likely cause loss of human life. Six states that gained high hazard ponds include:
 * Indiana: Harding Street Station, Indianapolis: 2 high hazard ponds

Related SourceWatch Articles

 * Existing U.S. Coal Plants
 * Indiana and coal
 * AES
 * United States and coal
 * Global warming