Both Hyperion and local opposition groups will appeal the South Dakota Board of Minerals and Environment’s Aug. 20 decision to approve a revised version of Hyperion’s air quality permit.
The permit concerns Hyperion’s proposal to build a multi-billion dollar, 400,000 barrel per day oil refinery in Union County, S.D.
Hyperion will seek lighter restrictions for carbon monoxide emissions, according to a Sept. 28 press release. Opposition groups Save Union County, Citizens Against Oil Pollution, and the Living River group of the Sierra Club seek to overturn the Board’s approval of the permit, said Ed Cable of Save Union County. Both appeals were filed in the Hughes County Circuit Court in Pierre before the Sept. 28 deadline.
Citizens are active in both their support and opposition to Hyperion. Jim Towler, Citizens for Hyperion chief spokesperson, said his group got active before the June 2008 primary, when Hyperion’s request to re-zone more than 3,000 acres of agricultural land for industrial development was approved with 58 percent of the vote in Union County. Towler said Citizens for Hyperion raised money from private sources to help fund the campaign.
“We wanted to have real people contribute to supporting the Hyperion project,” Towler said. “If Hyperion is able to do what they say they’re going to do, then they deserve the opportunity to go forward with that project.”
First-year graduate student Nick Bubak said he thinks the proposed refinery is a serious environmental risk and an irresponsible investment.
“Developing a petroleum refinery is a huge waste of money,” Bubak said. “We should be investing in alternative forms of energy.”
Towler said he believes that Hyperion will be able to live up to its promise to build an environmentally sound refinery, but he thinks that support for the project will dwindle if the promise isn’t kept.
“If they cannot build a plant that is as environmentally sound as they say, then I think you’ll see a lot of people who are supporters of this project turn against it,” Towler said.
Senior Ryan Budmayr said he was confident that the state would thoroughly review the project and thinks it’s a good move for South Dakota.
“South Dakota can really lead the way on something like this,” Budmayr said.
James Hoefelmeyer, assistant professor of chemistry at USD and a vocal opponent of Hyperion, encourages more research on solar power to replace or cutdown on oil use in the U.S.
“There’s more energy in a week’s worth of sunlight than in all the world’s oil reserves,” he said. “That’s a calculation that I would be happy to show anyone how to do,” Hoefelmeyer said.
Budmayr sees the Hyperion Energy Center as an important economic opportunity for the region.
“(Hyperion) offers South Dakota a chance to bring in numerous high-paying job opportunities for college graduates,” he said.
Hoefelmeyer doesn’t discount the potential economic benefits that the refinery could have on the region.
“It’s not like I don’t see the business side, but you have to think about sustainability and the finite nature of this planet,” Hoefelmeyer said. “It’s time to think about diversifying our energy supply rather than putting all of our eggs in one basket.”
According to its Web site, Hyperion claims the refinery will be the cleanest in the nation.
Jim Heisinger, chairperson of the local Living River and professor emeritus of biology at USD, said the Hyperion refinery would emit more carbon dioxide into the air per barrel of oil refined than any other refinery in operation. He is also concerned about straining current infrastructure with increased traffic and population during the plant’s construction and operation.
Eric Williams, of Gallatin public affairs, a public relations company that handles media relations for Hyperion, would not comment on Hyperion’s role in paying for necessary infrastructure upgrades, like highways and railroads, should the company move in to the area or other potential sites for the refinery still under consideration.
Robert Graham, a Chicago-based attorney representing the opposition said his clients are primarily concerned with the implementation of Environmental Protection Agency-required Best Available Control Technology and whether local air quality, as a result of the plant’s emissions, will satisfy environmental regulations. The opposition groups are also concerned with whether the public was properly informed in time for the public comment period and whether Hyperion adequately addressed and identified the various air pollutants in its permit application.
They also seek an environmental impact statement for the plant, detailing impacts during both the four-year expected construction period and the refinery’s subsequent operation. The South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources has the authority to require an impact statement from anyone looking to build a major source of pollution in the state, but in the case of Hyperion, the DENR didn’t ask for one, Cable said.
“People are being denied information,” Heisinger said. “That’s really what Bob Graham, with Jenner and Block, will be presenting to the court (during the appeal).”
These grievances and others are listed in a lengthy document titled “Citizen’s Proposed Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Proposing Order,” dated Aug. 12, eight days before the permit was granted. In the document, opponents say it is undisputed that the Hyperion Energy Center will produce significant other forms of air pollution, including 1,900 tons per year of carbon monoxide, 773 tons per year of nitrogen oxide, 863 tons per year of sulfur dioxide, 1,046 tons per year of fine particulate matter (microscopic particles of volatile organic chemicals and heavy metals), and 19 million tons per year of carbon dioxide.
Hyperion and the DENR provided similar documents to the Board of Minerals and Environment during the hearings in Pierre last month.
“The parties have their respective positions,” Graham said. “It’s up to the courts to (decide) who’s correct. I’m sure the state courts will do a fine job in trying to evaluate those issues.”
Reach reporter Daniel Mollet at Daniel.Mollet@usd.edu.
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