Fluor Daniel Gets Emissions-Monitoring Contract

Fluor Daniel announced Tuesday that it has received a contract to put emission monitoring systems in 19 smokestacks for Commonwealth Edison Co. of Chicago, a sign that after several years of confusion, utilities and industrial plants are moving to comply with new environmental regulations.

“It is indicative of a trend,” said Fluor spokesperson Deborah Land. Continuous emission monitoring systems track and record the level of pollutants released via smokestacks by the burning of fossil fuels. About 2,200 of the nation’s industrial smokestacks must have such systems installed by Jan. 1, 1995, to comply with Title IV of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. So far, only 500 stacks have any monitoring systems, and none of the 2,200 have all the monitoring equipment needed to comply with the law, Land said.

“Since the Clean Air Act was implemented in 1990, utilities have been trying to determine what requirements they will need to meet to comply,” Land said. Because of revisions to the act, there has been confusion over exactly what the law required, and industries are just beginning to take action, she said.

This is the second smokestack contract Fluor has announced this year. The first contract was for engineering and design work for a monitoring system for TU Electric, a subsidiary of Texas Utilities Co.

The 19 stacks are located at 10 Commonwealth Edison coal-burning stations in northern Illinois. About half of the power Commonwealth Electric supplies to its 3 million customers is derived from burning coal.

The value of the Commonwealth Electric contract was not announced. In addition to providing basic engineering for field installation of the systems, Fluor will also prepare an operating procedures manual and supervise the testing and certification of the systems. Installation is expected to be complete by mid-1994.

Fluor Daniel is the principal subsidiary of Fluor Corp., an international engineering and construction firm.