COLORADO SPRINGS – One of the nation’s last coal-fired power plants in the middle of a city may shut down a decade sooner than planned as Colorado Springs leaders contemplate climate action and urban revitalization along a creek.

Environmental groups led by the Sierra Club welcomed the prospect of swifter removal of the 80-year-old Martin Drake Power Plant, following closures of coal-fired facilities in Boulder, Atlanta, Chicago and Denver.

This is happening as residents of Colorado Springs (pop. 465,000) increasingly raise concerns about sulfur dioxide (SO2) and other pollution. On Thursday, residents pressed state health officials to reject a proposal to declare Drake “in attainment” of federal air quality standards for SO2, a toxic gas that mixes with other pollutants and hangs over the city against mountains, with the potential to cause asthma, heart disease and other lung problems after even brief exposure. Colorado Springs Utilities plant operators this year deployed “scrubbers” to clean emissions, and federal Environmental Protection Agency overseers this week said average monthly SO2 emissions decreased to 31 tons a month, down from 330 tons a month in 2015.

But Colorado air quality control commissioners voted 8-1 against re-designating Drake as a facility in compliance with federal air quality requirements, acknowledging public health concerns and calls for cleaner air.

Moving to Colorado Springs from Arizona six years ago seeking a healthier environment, Ashlette Lopez told the commissioners she was dismayed to see “a huge increase in my son’s asthma issues” — Lopez blamed Drake emissions — requiring daily use of an inhaler and less time outdoors. “It’s hard,” she said. “He is a 6-year-old boy and wants to run.”

Taking time off school, Haven Coleman, 11, testified that “having asthma attacks is no fun. It is scary…. Kids should know that adults are working to protect their right to breathe. … The air quality commission is supposed to protect us from poisons, not give us more.”

The air concerns coincide with brainstorming by the Colorado Springs council members and developers about using the site of the Drake plant, downtown along Fountain Creek, for green space and a museum celebrating the Olympics. For years, Colorado Springs has served as the home of the U.S. Olympic Committee and a training center for athletes.

City council members have directed the municipal utility to analyze possibilities for ramping up the 2035 date for closing the plant to 2025, council president Richard Skorman told The Denver Post. And council members are mulling possibilities for shutting one of the two remaining generators in the plant sooner, by 2023, Skorman said.

“Some of us would like to move it just because it is a huge blight on the downtown environment,” he said. “We have the ability to create a great green-way connection down there. … If we could move it out of downtown, we could use that site for urban redevelopment.”

The new scrubbers have reduced the SO2 that may have caused problems in the past, he said, but city officials also are interested in cutting emissions of carbon dioxide, the heat-trapping greenhouse gas, another product of burning coal to generate electricity.

“Nobody really wants a power plant in the middle of downtown and the valley,” Skorman said.

Sierra Club advocates are encouraging this move, and on Thursday also urged the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment not to re-designate the Drake plant. They argued that CDPHE has not collected enough data to be able to guarantee that standards have been attained. They cite SO2 emissions in central Colorado Springs as one of dozens of examples nationwide where EPA officials have allowed potentially dangerous air pollution at excessive levels by using “un-classifiable” designations instead of declaring plants in violation of clean air laws.

“While we have argued for more accurate and protective designations, the EPA has largely proposed ‘un-classifiable’ designations. The Sierra Club is actively working in Colorado, and across the nation, to ensure that the major contributors to SO2 pollution — coal-fired plants — are held accountable to protect our public health, ” Sierra Club Beyond Coal Campaign representative Zach Pierce said.

Pierce and Center for Biological Diversity attorney Robert Ukeiley backed up residents, telling commissioners that classifying Drake as compliant based on average SO2 emissions levels would mask potentially deadly spikes.

The amount of SO2 spewing out of Drake’s towers in an hour, while generally lower than in previous years, can surge up to three times higher than an hourly limit that equates to roughly 300 pounds, Ukeiley said. Federal authorities have determined SO2 at high levels can constrict airways after exposures as brief as five minutes.

“Now is the time when Colorado Springs Utilities should be taking advantage of federal tax credits for wind and solar, before they may phase out,” Pierce said. “Drake is the only remaining coal plant in the heart of an urban area. Other utilities, like Xcel, are making it clear that wind and utility-scale solar are the least-cost resources available. And they are moving swiftly to lock in renewable energy that still benefits from federal tax credits,” he said. “Shifting to clean energy also helps meet Governor Hickenlooper’s clean energy executive order.”

Coal-fired power plants and other industrial facilities nationwide have faced scrutiny amid concerns about climate change and pollution. Colorado Springs Utilities environmental services officer Dave Padgett acknowledged residents’ worries. He emphasized the big cuts in S02 pollution after the installation of scrubbers. A CDPHE decision declaring the plant in attainment of health limits would have given greater certainty to residents and businesses looking to move to Colorado Springs that the air is safe, Padgett said.

“We will continue to operate the plant in a manner that continues the reduction of SO2 emissions.”