The Seattle Times: Nation & World: New power plants may affect parks’ air By Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post

In the past four years, power companies have deluged regulators with applications to build power plants in locations that could affect air quality and visibility in national parks or wilderness areas, according to federal statistics compiled by the nonpartisan Natural Resources News Service.

Since 2000, the number of permits sought for plants within 62 miles of park boundaries has quadrupled compared with the previous five years, and 33 of the 280 proposed plants would be coal-fired. Both trends have sparked concern among federal and state officials.

Utilities between 1995 and 1999 built only 10 coal plants nationwide, none within that distance of a national park or wilderness.

The trend is particularly pronounced near some popular tourist meccas in the West, where Park Service and state officials say visibility-obscuring haze is on the rise.

Several recent studies indicate that while visibility is improving in many parks on the east and west coasts, the overall number of low-visibility days is increasing. A federal report found that, as of 1999, on the 20 percent of days when skies are haziest, “most parks show at least some degradation or worsening of conditions, especially in the Southwestern U.S.,” compared with 1900. A Park Service report last year concluded that, “poor air quality currently impairs visibility in every national park and most, if not all, wilderness areas.” …

Outside Colorado’s Mesa Verde National Park, home to ancient Anasazi cliff dwellings, three power-plant applications are pending, as well as a plan to drill 10,000 gas wells over 20 years, said George San Miguel, the park’s natural-resource manager.

“If all these things happen, Mesa Verde could be negatively impacted,” San Miguel said.