An Atlanta court is forcing the Georgia Environmental Protection Division to reconsider a permit for a new coal plant in Southwest Georgia. The court wants to know how operators of the plant plan to test for pollutants.

The court’s ruling says the 1200 megawatt facility’s methods for monitoring pollution are not stringent enough.

Kurt Ebersbach is an attorney for the environmental group Greenlaw which opposes the plant. He says the court found the permit would not include emissions from the entire facility.

“It will miss various pollutants that will be emitted from the facility. They would not even be measured under a monitoring and reporting scheme that EPD and Longleaf had defended as a robust permitting scheme.”

Ebersbach says EPD could take months to make changes to the permit. The Longleaf Power Plant in Early County was first proposed in 2001. In November the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to issue tighter regulations on air pollution.

Tags: coal fired power plant, Long Leaf plant, Georgia Environmental Protection