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Author: Admin | 2025-04-27
On Thursday, a judge annulled the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s denial of an air emissions permit for Greenidge Generation LLC’s power plant, effectively vacating a DEC closure order that was to set be carried out this week.The decision allows Greenidge to continue operating its controversial Bitcoin mining facility at the plant on the shore of Seneca Lake in Dresden, pending further administrative proceedings within the agency.State Supreme Court Justice Vincent M. Dinolfo ruled that the DEC has statutory authority to deny air permits for facilities that violate the state’s 2019 climate law, CLCPA (Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act). But he concluded that the agency committed an “error of law” when it failed to consider potential justification for the plant’s inconsistency with the climate law mandates.The judge annulled a May 8 decision by DEC Regional Director Dereth Glance that had rejected Greenidge’s application to renew its Title V air emissions permit. In that ruling, Glance had terminated a lengthy adjudicatory hearing process within the agency, finding that the plant’s emissions were inconsistent with the goals of CLCPA.But Dinolfo ruled that Glance’s denial “had no rational basis for its decision to forego CLCPA’s justification analysis…. [T]he denial of the renewal application … was thus affected by an error of law and was arbitrary and capricious.”The judge ordered Greenidge’s permit application review to be “remitted to the DEC for further proceedings,” including an analysis of whether the plant’s inconsistency with CLCPA was justified.That analysis could delve into the plant’s role in
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