Transcript documents DNR's shenanigans

An application for a permit for a $250 million, gas-fired power plant to be built in Cape Girardeau County has been pending with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources since late 2000. Kinder Morgan Power Co. is seeking a permit to operate a 530-megawatt facility south of Crump along Route U.

At issue is whether the required air-quality permit will be issued as Kinder Morgan requested, or whether DNR will continue to enforce a requirement that the company install expensive equipment that Kinder Morgan says will increase operating expenses by $916,000 annually.

DNR officials question the company's cost estimates and say Kinder Morgan hasn't met its burden of proving the additional equipment isn't economically feasible.

Months of fruitless negotiations led to DNR's rejection of the permit application last September. Last month, a four-day hearing on the dispute was held in front of an administrative hearing officer, producing an 850-page transcript. That hearing officer is expected to present his findings to the Missouri Clean Air Commission at a July 25 meeting. A final ruling by the commission likely won't occur before its Aug. 29 meeting.

The disagreement could be chalked up to a dispute between experts -- with one rather considerable caveat. David Randall was the lead DNR engineer handling the Kinder Morgan permit through most of the process. Now working for a private environmental consulting firm, Randall testified on behalf of Kinder Morgan and gave his opinion that the equipment DNR officials were asking for wasn't cost-effective and that the permit should be issued as the company requested.

DNR hired a respected private firm to provide a neutral, third-party opinion regarding the issue of cost-effectiveness. This firm also declared that the equipment demanded by DNR wasn't cost-effective. DNR officials didn't like this, because it wasn't the answer they had solicited.

Randall's testimony was absolutely devastating to the DNR position. He testified that he received an e-mail from his superior at DNR that instructed him to "create as many ... scenarios as necessary" to come up with a lower cost figure, one that would prove DNR's demands to be cost-effective. Randall further testified that despite running 40 different scenarios, he couldn't comply with this directive.

There's more -- much more -- in the lengthy transcript. But people close to the dispute can see where this is going. They are joining with the presiding hearing officer, who urged DNR officials to settle.

So far the governor and key aides who speak for him are mum. But before the leaves fly this fall, we should have an answer from the Clean Air Commission. That answer will be either to issue the permit or to side with DNR's continuing, don't-confuse-us-with-facts shenanigans, in which case the company will likely ask for a court review.

At that point, Missourians will be entitled to wonder: Just who, exactly, runs DNR: the chief executive of this state, or the mid- and upper-level staff of that agency? What guidelines direct them, and to whom are they accountable?