Baltimore Gas & Electric Co. switched on the second of two coal-burning electric generators, opposed by county environmentalists, in Pasadena Tuesday.

Brandon Shores Unit II can produce 642 megawatts of electricity, roughly one-tenth the power company's capacity, spokesman Arthur Slusark said.

A Glen Burnie-based environmental group asked the state to require BG & E to install expensive anti-air pollution devices on the plant's smokestack.

Mary Rosso, president of the Maryland Waste Coalition, sought to require scrubbers to remove sulfur dioxide, a major component of acid rain.

BG & E officials have countered that the newplant already complies with state and federal clean air laws.

Construction on Unit II was delayed during the 1970s and early 1980s because of the energy crisis and the slowing economy. In 1979, utility planners redesigned the plant from an oil- to a coal-fired generator.

Work began in 1987, and BG & E officials hoped to complete it in 1992. Slusark said they accelerated construction as the state grew faster than expected during the late 1980s.

On the west shore of thePatapsco River 10 miles southeast of Baltimore, the Brandon Shores plant sits at Fort Smallwood Road and Energy Parkway.