Students and teachers say no to power plants

It seems that the cavalry is starting to arrive for those who have been fighting the construction of the power plants here in Hayward. The speakers were students, faculty and community organizers who have been working for months now to stop Hayward from sliding into an inefficient, irresponsible past and to push it towards a "greener," more energy efficient future.

Diane Zuliani, head of the Chabot Faculty Senate, came next, reviewing the most salient bits of information. Hayward City Council's decision to open up the door to zoning power plants back in 2001 completely overlooked the myriad of health hazards that would result; that, or they think the health of the people living here in Hayward is expendable.

Zuliani pointed out that while burning natural gases is a cleaner energy source, it is by no means clean. The contaminants and pollutants expelled into the air would worsen the quality of life for everyone in Hayward. Zuliani acknowledged the need for energy but noted that one of the proposed power plants, the Russell City Power Plant also called the Calpine Energy Center, would not even generate energy for Hayward. Chabot College would be severely impacted by the smog, so would elementary schools in Hayward.

Assir followed up by shedding light on some legal loopholes that allow polluting companies to bypass strict environmental laws via the purchase of "Emission Reduction Credits."

Begonia Cerreda further elaborated on the repercussions the power plants would have on health.

A health instructor at Chabot, she talked about a few of the toxic air contaminants that both the Eastshore Energy Center and the Calpine Energy Center would produce. Acrolein, a severely irritating contaminant to eyes and throats as well as a component in tear gas, has been shown to cause lung cancer. Cerreda noted that the heaviest impacted zone would be Chabot College, in particular the area where athletes train and thus breathe in more of the air that would be contaminated with acrolein, formaldehyde, ammonia, etc.

Rob Simpson, one of the community organizers and a "green" minded citizen running for the Hayward City Council, finished off by recapping the current developments.

While things are finally starting to coalesce in a positive way, this campaign has been greatly skewed towards the opposition. A decision that took the Hayward City council only 42 minutes to make has resulted in thousands of hours of people protesting and attempting a reversal of the decision.

Simpson lobbied the City Council and even went so far as taking this unfair issue to the state Supreme Court and eventually Washington, D.C. Simpson is running for City Council along with Anna May and Francisco Zermeño, all of whom are hoping to keep Hayward from going backwards and to seriously consider alternatives that will not compromise the quality of life for Hayward citizens.