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Her Dirty Secret

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With interest from companies that supply electricity to Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas, Sunflower had plans to build a full 1,400 megawatts — roughly enough to light up all the homes in Johnson and Wyandotte counties. If approved, Sunflower's plant would make the small Kansas town home to one of the biggest new coal complexes west of the Mississippi River.

Sunflower has enjoyed the support of some of the state's most powerful lawmakers.

At their homes in Ingalls and Hugoton, House Speaker Melvin Neufeld and Senate President Stephen Morris both use power generated by Sunflower.

Neufeld says western Kansans see the coal plants as vital to the region's economic growth. A study by Fort Hays State University professor Ralph Gamble (commissioned by Sunflower) estimates that the new complex would create 2,000 jobs during the construction of the plants and 400 permanent jobs once the $3 billion project is complete. Over the lifetime of the plants, Gamble projects, the total economic benefit to the state could exceed $8 billion.

"I don't know of a larger economic- development project that's ever occurred in Kansas," says Sunflower spokesman Miller.

But the project would have a dramatic environmental impact as well.

According to the draft permit, plants would release 8 million pounds of nitrogen oxide and 11 million pounds of sulfur dioxide — key components in smog and acid rain — and would spew 17 million pounds of carbon monoxide (a cause of respiratory ailments) and 1,100 pounds of mercury (which has been linked to autism and birth defects).

The coal plants would also suck up more than 5 billion gallons of water each year from the quickly depleting Ogallala aquifer, which supplies vital irrigation to Kansas crops.

Topping the list of environmental problems is the emission of carbon dioxide, the gas widely considered most responsible for global warming. Already, Kansas is ranked 10th in the country when it comes to most CO2 pollution per capita. (Kansas gets 75 percent of its electricity from coal. That keeps energy cheap, but it means the state creates nearly 40 million metric tons of carbon dioxide each year. Earlier this year, an Associated Press analysis concluded that each Kansan produces 14 tons of carbon dioxide each year, nearly twice the national average of 8 tons.)

The Holcomb complex would add another 10 million tons of carbon dioxide to Kansas skies each year.

Western Kansas residents such as Senate President Morris and House Speaker Neufeld say they're not worried about the environmental implications.

"We have a lot of those kinds of things worldwide, and this is just a drop in the bucket compared to what's out there, I suppose, in terms of global warming," Morris says.

"The people that are opposing the plant forget that we grow a lot of corn out here, and corn uses up all the CO2 it can get," Neufeld says.

Both Neufeld and Morris stress that Kansas needs the power.

But locals will use only a small portion of it. With the vast majority of the power bound for consumers as far away as New Mexico and Texas, less than 15 percent of Holcomb's new electricity would provide power to homes and businesses in Kansas.

To Bill Griffith, the Kansas Sierra Club's legal chairman, that's a no-win situation.

"They get 90 percent of the electricity, and we get 100 percent of the pollution," Griffith says.

Typically, the state chapters of the Sierra Club handle their own local campaigns. But the national organization is throwing its larger weight behind the opposition to Sunflower. The size of the project, the sea change in public opinion about global warming, the opportunity to satisfy Kansas' manageable population with the abundant wind resources, Griffith says, have put a spotlight on the Sunflower State.

And on Sebelius.

"We figured out a long time ago," Griffith says, "that she's in favor of these plants." Gov. Sebelius has graced the pages of Time as one of the nation's top five governors and made Newsweek's list of "Who's Next 2007." She was elected by her peers as chairwoman of the Democratic Governors Association late last year, and her name has come up as a potential vice presidential candidate in 2008.

Over the past five years, Sebelius has built a reputation as a moderate leader. With a willingness to work both sides of the partisan aisle, the governor balanced the state budget in her first year in office and has made progress on issues such as education and economic development, despite Kansas' deeply divided political landscape.

During her first term, Sebelius appointed Republicans to her cabinet. When she ran a second time in 2006, the governor inspired other conservatives, such as Lt. Gov. Mark Parkinson, to switch parties.

In her 2007 State of the State address, Sebelius sounded serious about climate change. "There can be no doubt, our current energy sources are causing dramatic, even dangerous changes to our climate," she said.

She explained that she'd met with leaders of Kansas utilities. "We discussed the need to diversify our energy sources and to promote alternatives to coal. It's [coal's] economically cheap, but its health and environmental costs are rising."

She pledged to work out an agreement with electric producers to generate more power from wind and to secure $1 million in state funding for an agency to help transport that clean power. She made good on both of those promises.

This past spring, the governor also signed an executive order increasing energy efficiency in government buildings and she hired an auditor to oversee the state's new conservation initiatives. When Greensburg was leveled by a tornado, she took the lead in advocating that the town be rebuilt to green-construction standards and powered with renewable energy.

But faced with the state's most contentious energy issue, Sebelius has compromised her new green ethic.

The governor declined the Pitch's requests for an interview to discuss her opinions about the Sunflower expansion and her vision for Kansas energy production. Instead, she responded — selectively — to a list of written questions.

"Developing a safe and dependable mix of electrical generation to support growing demand not just in Kansas but worldwide, is an enormously complex issue for which there is no silver bullet solution," the governor wrote when asked her stance on the new coal-fired power plants.

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