The Ames power plant may not be producing the large amount of dioxins that was previously suggested, according to a report presented to the Ames City Council Tuesday.

Robert Brown, director of the Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies and professor of mechanical engineering, was asked by the Ames City Council to do a study on this facility.

The council asked him to determine the accuracy of a report written last year by Barry Commoner, researcher and professor for Queens College in New York, claiming that Ames was one of the leading dioxin-polluting locations of the Arctic Circle.

According to Brown’s report, Commoner overestimated the amount of fuel used by the plant, as well as the accurate dioxin emissions for the type of equipment and fuel the facility uses.

“Accordingly, the Ames plant emits about four hundred times less dioxin than assumed by Commoner, and meets the dioxin emission standards set by the U.S. [Environmental Protection Agency],” Brown said in his report.

Sharon Wirth of the Ames City Council explained why Brown’s expertise was recruited.

“We asked him to look into reasonable levels of dioxins that other plant facilities might be putting into the air and then look at the Ames plant specifically in terms of its emissions,” she said.

Brown’s findings supported the suspicions of many city council members, Wirth said.

“We certainly are pleased to have [Brown’s] results confirm what we felt all along about the plant,” she said. “We felt we were always on the right track in saying we have very low dioxin levels, but we were pleased to have our suspicions confirmed by an expert in the field.”

Council member Steve Goodhue said the city council voted unanimously not to pursue any further investigation at this time.

Commoner said he received Brown’s report but was not willing to comment since he has not read it yet.

“It was sent to me a day ago,” he said. “It’s got a lot of numbers in it, and it needs to be studied. We won’t be finished, as far as I’m concerned, until next week.”