WV DEP wraps up hearing over appeal of air quality permit for proposed Tucker County power plant

by Caity Coyne, West Virginia Watch
December 4, 2025

Proceedings wrapped Thursday for a hearing regarding a requested appeal of the Department of Environmental Protection’s Air Quality Board’s decision to grant a permit to Fundamental Data for the construction of a natural gas power plant in Tucker County.

The request for an appeal came from the three organizations — the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, the Sierra Club and Tucker United, a grassroots organization that formed in Tucker County earlier this year to fight against the power plant as well as the proposed data center that it could one day power.

The citizen groups — represented by Mike Becher, a senior attorney with Appalachian Mountain Advocates — requested the appeal in September. In filings to the board, they allege generally that the permit granted to Fundamental Data in August fails to meet standards set by the state’s Air Pollution Control Act. 

The citizens cited numerous specific objections to the permit. The most pressing objection questions the DEP’s determination that the proposed project qualifies as a “minor” source of pollution, which means it would be subject to laxer regulations regarding emissions. In filings, the organizations question whether this designation from the Air Quality Board was “arbitrary, capricious or otherwise contrary to the law given the ability (and likelihood) of the facility to operate well above the limits established …” Other similarly sized and operated power plants, they continue, are “typically” permitted as “major sources.”

The proposed power plant would use gas-fueled turbines with heat recovery steam generators to operate, according to Fundamental Data’s permit application. Diesel would be kept on site in three 10 million gallon storage tanks as a backup power source in case of gas line interruptions. Those tanks would be 66 feet tall and 180 feet in diameter. Leaks from pumps and valves, among other pieces of equipment, are to be expected per the application. Operations for the facility should begin by 2028.

Annually, the facility would have the potential to emit 99 tons of nitrogen oxides, 56 tons of carbon monoxide and 44 tons of volatile organic compounds.

And aside from the emissions, the complex — once completed — could take up more than 10,000 acres between the outdoor tourism-dependent towns of Thomas and Davis.

The citizen groups have argued that heavy redactions within the permit application used to calculate potential annual emissions make it impossible for the public to understand the “practical effect” of the actual emissions.

Fundamental Data — which acted as an intervenor in the appeal case — has said these redactions are necessary due to the information being “confidential business information.” Earlier this year, the DEP agreed that the company met standards that allow it to keep that information secret.

Last month, the Air Quality Board  — a type of judicial panel responsible for ruling in these kinds of cases — issued a protective order allowing some of the redacted information to be made available to parties in the appeal case. Anyone who was allowed access to the information, per the order, was required to destroy it upon completion of the hearing. That order came after a previous board hearing was held in the case in November. 

This week, discussion of the redacted information was kept under seal during the proceedings, meaning the public still was not able to hear any arguments or testimony regarding its contents. Redacted information in the case includes emissions data, the number and size of the turbines that will be on site and details regarding the make and model of some equipment.

In their appeal, the citizen groups are essentially asking the board  to revoke Fundamental Data’s permit and make information that was used to grant the permit in the first place available to the public.

The hearing took place from Wednesday into Thursday morning, with numerous witnesses ranging from Tucker County residents and local political leaders to engineers familiar with the technical aspects of the proposed project.

‘We deserve to know those basic things’: Residents speak out against permit

Taking the stand Wednesday morning, Canaan Valley resident Amy Margolies told members of the board she lives about an eight minute drive from where the proposed power plant would be located. She said she moved to West Virginia — and specifically the Canaan Valley region — in June 2016 to be closer to nature.

“I moved here to be in the outdoors, in this great area and in a small community with tight relationships, a place where you don’t have to lock your car,” Margolies said. “… I think anyone who has been to Canaan Valley or Blackwater Falls, Davis or Thomas knows how much of a gem this area is. It’s really special in the United States and even with the state of West Virginia.”

A mother of two and with a background in public health, Margolies said she’s acutely concerned about her family’s health and what could happen if this power plant is built less than two miles from her 5-year-old son’s school, where she coaches his soccer team.

“There is information in my brain from my education and my experience that makes me legitimately concerned for my children, for my family,” Margolies said. “… I have health issues in my family that provide certain vulnerabilities. We all know that comorbidities can be a concern for many people. For children, the elderly — air quality is a huge part of that, and exposure over a period of time is really a concern.”

Recently, she said, her husband who is in his early 40s suffered a pulmonary embolism. Since chronic exposure to air pollution — specifically from fine particulate matter and nitrogen oxides — has been linked to increased risks of blood clots, she said she’s concerned about what having those emissions in the air around their home would mean for him.

“That’s something I can’t stop thinking about,” she said. 

Margolies, in response to questions from Becher, told the board that the redactions in the air quality permit application have made it difficult for her and her neighbors to gauge the real risk that could come with this power plant. Essentially, she said, they’ve been asked to trust a company — Fundamental Data — that has refused to work with or hear directly from concerned residents.

“… Basically what we’re being told here as the public is that we should take someone else’s word [that this is safe],” Margolies said. “I don’t even know this person. We’ve invited this person to our community, and they won’t come and I’m just really concerned. Why should I take someone else’s word for it, when they won’t even tell us, in plain words, with basic information, how tall will smokestacks be?”

She said that if the power plant becomes reality and if no effort is made to allow community members to know more about its operations, she will have to strongly reconsider moving her family.

“It would break my heart, but I can’t allow my children to be exposed to that risk,” Margolies said. “… I think, as a mom, we deserve to know those basic things, because I coach soccer right there [and] I moved here for my child to play soccer in front of a forest, not in the shadow of a smoke stack. I think we deserve the minimum amount of information to understand how that will impact our lives.”

Davis Mayor Alan Tomson took the stand following Margolies. Tomson told the board that he did have concerns over the proposed power plant and was put off by the way the project came to be. The decisions and actions by Fundamental Data, he said, made it difficult to fully trust the company or understand how his community could change if the power plant and data center complex were built.

Tomson said he only learned of the project when a resident called to inform him of a notice in the local newspaper. From there, he said, it was difficult to get further information and the redactions in the air quality permit application made the true scope of the project hard to grasp.

He told the board that he would have felt more confident without those redactions. It’s not right, he said, that worries from residents aren’t being treated seriously and he himself holds grave concerns over how the operation could impact his town’s tourism revenue, quality of life and more.

Marilyn Shoenfeld, a Davis resident who serves as board president for the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, echoed the concerns of Tomson and Margolies. Shoenfeld said she’s lived in Tucker County since 2007. Now, almost two decades later, she still greatly enjoys and takes advantage of the outdoor recreation opportunities around her.

“We moved here because of clean air, the healthy environment, the natural resources, the protected public lands, the availability of hiking, of access to Dolly Sods and the wonderful small towns of Davis and Thomas,” Shoenfeld said. “My concern is that the air quality will be deteriorated, and that it will affect the various habitats and environments, including the Canaan Valley National Wildlife refuge … as well as the towns of Davis and Thomas.”

She also worries that emissions — even if they don’t exceed the levels listed in the air quality permit application — will impact her health. Further, she said, it’s been impossible to accurately gauge what the effect will be from the development since critical information is redacted.

“The permit was so thoroughly redacted that you really could not tell what was going on,” Shoenfeld said. 

In an effort to learn more, Shoenfeld said the Highlands Conservancy offered to hold a meeting with Fundamental Data in Canaan Valley. The company, she said, refused. The organization then proposed to produce and pay for dispersion modeling to learn more about how the emissions and potential haze from the facility would spread. Again, she said, they were turned down.

Without knowing more, Shoenfeld said she would feel better seeing the project dedicated as a major source so it would be subject to higher regulations and testing standards.

The efficacy of potential annual emissions

Ron Sahu, a mechanical engineer with a Ph.D. in coal combustion from Caltech, was next to testify in the hearing, taking the stand as an expert witness.

Sahu told the board that he’s consulted on many air quality permits nationwide and was surprised to see that the application from Fundamental Data was for a “minor” pollution source. He said that while he understands that’s the preference of the company, it’s difficult for him to understand how that would work in practice, especially given the size and scope of the power plant.

Sahu also said he’s dealt with hundreds of air quality permits in his line of work and had never seen redactions allowed to the extent that they have been in this application. While Sahu was allowed to view and testify upon redacted information in a closed session for the hearing, the information was not able to be discussed publicly.

Based on his own scaling and calculations, Sahu testified publicly that it’s unlikely the emissions from the power plant would remain within the limits provided on Fundamental Data’s permit application.

There is too much variability, he continued, to say with any confidence that emissions would not exceed the standards that define a “minor” or “major” source. He used examples of how weather could impact how hot fuel is burnt, changes to emissions during start-up and shut-downs of a cycle and the kind of gas — methane or diesel — that would be used at different times. 

Without more specifics, he said, there’s no guarantee that emissions would be capped where they need to be.

“So this is a permit by algebra, and it means nothing because the variability can overwhelm you,” Sahu said. 

Sahu said the decision to treat this plant as a minor source and not doing major source modeling — especially without having continuous emissions monitoring, which is not required of the project — is giving misleading results. 

“You are pretending here that you can actually demonstrate that you will be below the major source threshold, but even under the best of times, even if you had continuous monitoring — and here you don’t even have that — you’re truly flying blind,” Sahu said.

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