New Jersey is waging another legal battle over air pollution coming from a power plant outside the state's borders, officials said Thursday.

The state filed a notice of intent Thursday to sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over a coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania. The Reliant Energy plant spews 10 times the amount of acid-rain-causing pollution that it should, state officials say.

The pollution from these plants drifts over the Garden State -- a major reason why every North Jersey resident breathes dirty air.

The lawsuit would be the sixth the state Attorney General's Office has pressed over air pollution coming from outside the state.

This newest complaint objects to the five-year operating permit that Reliant Energy has requested for its coal-fired plant in Upper Mount Bethel Township, located across the Delaware River from Warren County.

New Jersey officials contend that the EPA should set deadlines for future pollution reductions and limits on the amount of coal that can be burned each hour.

A representative from Reliant Energy said the plant is adhering to all state and federal emission standards and that New Jersey's complaints are without merit.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection first made its demands in a petition filed with the EPA in July. The federal agency did not respond to the petition within 60 days, as required.

"It's unconscionable that the EPA to date has shown so little regard for the environmental and public-health concerns we have detailed in our petition," DEP Commissioner Lisa Jackson said in a statement. "In this case, the EPA is ignoring the law, and we are putting the agency on notice that it cannot continue to thumb its nose at the people of New Jersey."

A spokeswoman for the EPA regional office that serves Pennsylvania said the agency is reviewing the complaints.

"We will be responding as appropriate," said the spokeswoman, Donna Heron.

The crux of the state's complaint in all of the lawsuits is that the plants did not obey requirements of the New Source Review provisions of the Clean Air Act. Those rules say any plant that makes upgrades or increases its production capacity must also install the most up-to-date pollution-control technology.

Emissions at the Reliant plant, called the Portland Generating Station, have steadily increased over the years, a sign that significant modifications have been made and that the plant is burning more coal than it used to, said Bill O'Sullivan, director of the DEP's division of air quality.

O'Sullivan said the plant emits 30,000 tons of sulfur dioxide each year, a pollutant that causes acid rain and worsens smog conditions. Contending that a plant that size should emit only 3,000 tons, O'Sullivan also pointed out that, by 2011, all of New Jersey's power plants combined will only emit about 10,000 tons of sulfur dioxide a year.

"This one plant will be emitting three times the emissions of all of our plants combined," O'Sullivan said.

Pat Hammond, a spokeswoman for Reliant Energy, said no upgrades have been made to the plant. Instead, its output has increased only because it originally was not operating at full capacity.

"We are simply operating as the plant was designed," Hammond said.

E-mail: diskin@northjersey.com

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