Italy:

‘Clean’ Geothermal Energy Plant Sparks Protest in Italy (SmartPlanet.com)

Enel Green Power's Bagnore 3 plant

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere crossed 400 parts per million earlier that month, a threshold that signified the relentlessness of the march toward climate change. So why was the crowd protesting a plant, called Bagnore 4, that proposes to provide clean, renewable energy?

Geothermal plants in Larderello now power two million households. In 1998, Enel Green Power, which also operates plants in Nevada and is a subsidiary of Italy’s largest power company, built the Bagnore 3 plant at Mount Amiata; the facility provides 20 MWe of power, enough to power 62,000 homes.

The 40 MWe Bagnore 4 plant under construction here promises to save 70,000 metric tonnes (77 tons) of oil equivalent annually, but opponents say that it will pollute the air, produce carbon emissions and increase the concentration of arsenic in the local drinking water.

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