Destroying Forests and Polluting Communities in the Name of Climate Justice: The Story of the McNeil Biomass Plant in Burlington’s Old North End
By 350VT Intern, Claire Greenburger
The McNeil biomass plant, located in Burlington’s Old North End, was constructed with the intent of diversifying fuel sources in the early 1980s. Today, Burlington Electric Department claims that the McNeil plant is a clean, renewable energy source that reportedly lowers carbon emissions. The plant, however, has contributed to worsening environmental conditions in the Old North End, emitting harmful pollutants into the surrounding environment, which pose a threat to the health of one of Vermont’s poorest and most racially diverse communities in the state.
“In states, even in states as small as Vermont, there are places that people in government feel more comfortable placing polluting and more dangerous, hazardous industries . . . usually near poor people or people of color,” says Dan Fingas, VT Movement Politics Director at Rights & Democracy. “Burlington’s Old North End would be an example of one of those places.”
The McNeil plant generates 50 megawatts of electricity at full load, about enough to meet the needs of all of Burlington. Though proponents of biomass claim that it is an “environmentally sound” alternative to burning fossil fuels, scaled-up biomass plants, like the McNeil Plant, actually increase deforestation and biodiversity loss. Importing biomass from afar also causes additional transportation emissions. The plants themselves emit harmful nitrogen oxides into the air, which can increase a person's vulnerability to respiratory infections and asthma. Long-term exposure to nitrogen oxide can also cause chronic lung disease.
“There is particulate coming off of the McNeil plant. [The plant] was put both really close to the poorest part of town, which is the Old North End . . . and near farmland,” says Fingas. That farmland includes plots of land that has been given to refugee communities to grow food, “and it's also right across this small part of the river to Winooski, which is the most diverse town in Vermont. So, there's obviously health concerns there as well.”
The McNeil biomass plant in Burlington, VT.
A 2021 Harvard study found that burning natural gas, biomass, and wood now has more negative health impacts than burning coal. “Our findings show that while there are public health benefits from reducing coal emissions; gas, biomass, and wood are not clean or healthy alternative energy sources. Swapping one polluting fuel source for another is not a pathway to a healthy energy system,” Jonathan Buonocore Sc.D., a Research Scientist at the Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment at the Harvard Chan School, told Harvard Chan C-CHANGE. “Wind, solar, and other non-fuel combustion renewable energy are the healthiest energy sources available for generating electricity, powering our factories, and heating our homes,” says Buonocore.
This legislative session, 350Vermont has committed to supporting policies that end the use of biomass at the state level. 350VT supports heating policies that incentivize weatherization, energy conservation, heat pumps, and thermal networks–– not biofuels. The Affordable Heating Act (AHA), which is currently under consideration in the VT legislature, would regulate emissions from the heating of our homes, businesses, and other buildings. It would require fossil fuel dealers to earn clean heat credits by switching their fuel supply over time from fossil fuels to approved alternatives. The AHA as proposed would support heating fuel alternatives like biofuels, including liquid biofuels, biogas, and biomass, that are ineffective at reducing greenhouse gasses. Instead, 350VT is calling for a revised Affordable Heating Act that transitions us away from all carbon-based fuels for heating, disqualifying liquid biofuels, renewable natural gas, biomass, and hydrogen from earning clean heat credits. In its current form, the AHA fails to do this.
State-wide environmental injustice and disparities in exposure to toxic pollution motivated the progressive social justice organization and fellow member of the VT Renews Coalition, Rights & Democracy (RAD), to work towards establishing Green Justice Zones. These Green Justice Zones would identify Vermont communities that have been most burdened by environmental pollution. “The basic idea behind the Green Justice Zones is . . . having folks in the community that have been harmed by current policies be able to be part of a participatory process to decide how funds are spent in their communities,” says Fingas. The goal is “to ensure that we can create green justice zones . . . where folks actually have the ability to put money towards mitigation of pollution, and they are able to decide which projects are best for their community.”
Establishing the Old North End as a Green Justice Zone would allow the community to assess its own needs and have the resources and government funding necessary to build a safer living environment.
The pollution coming from the McNeil Plant in the Old North End serves as an example of how pollution, deforestation, and other harmful effects of biofuels disproportionately impact frontline and Indigenous communities, who already bear more than their fair share of climate burdens. Ending the use of biomass and biofuels is critical in supporting a just transition from fossil fuels to clean sources of renewable energy. Supporting the creation of Green Justice Zones, as proposed by RAD, would help facilitate a more equitable state and a healthy living environment for all Vermonters.
Vermonters at the 350VT Rally for Energy & Climate Justice on 2/11/2023. Photo credit: Fritz Senftleber.