DEP Fines Lehigh Valley Coal-Burning Plant for Air Pollution Violations

Susan Phillips

Recent Stories

Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

June 11, 2013 | 4:39 PM

Northampton Generating Company, which provides electricity to about 100 households in Northampton County, will pay $119,345 to the state’s Clean Air Fund. The Department of Environmental Protection says the company violated emission limits for carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide five times over two and a half years between 2009 and 2012. It also reported false daily emission data for two and a half months during 2012.
The air pollution violations coincided with the company filing for bankruptcy in December 2011, citing increased fuel costs. Court papers showed the company’s financial problems dated back to the fall of 2009. The plant burns coal, coke, ash, and a fuel made from old tires. It emerged from bankruptcy this March.