New West Energy Grok

Plans for New Coal Plants Lose Steam

By Richard Martin, 7-27-07

I’ve reported on several decisions in recent months by Western utilities, including Tri-State Energy and Generation of Denver, to scrap plans for building new coal-fired power plants. Opponents of new coal-burning plants also got a boost when a private-equity group bought giant utility TXU and said it would scale back the company’s plans for new coal plants.

Now that movement has spread nationwide (Sub. req.), according to The Wall Street Journal, which reported this week that :"From coast to coast, plans for a new generation of coal-fired power plants are falling by the wayside as states conclude that conventional coal plants are too dirty to build and the cost of cleaner plants is too high.”

Journal reporter Rebecca Smith writes that in the last few months plans for many of the 150 or so new coal-fired generating plants on the books have been scrapped or delayed, and many more may fall victim to global-warming concerns. “Nearly two dozen coal projects have been canceled since early 2006, according to the National Energy Technology Laboratory in Pittsburgh, a division of the Department of Energy,” writes Smith.

In addition, major coal-mining companies saw their stocks downgraded last week, as analysts at Citigroup noted that “prophesies of a new wave of coal-fired generation have vaporized.”

This welcome trend only makes more urgent the push for clearner alternatives to coal – including natural gas, which currently supplies only 20 percent of U.S. energy needs.

In other energy news:

-- Renewed uranium mining on the Western Slope still stirs strong resistance, even with the promise of jobs and new wealth. That’s what Richard Clement, president and chief executive of Powertech Uranium Corp., found out during a town meeting in Nunn, in Weld Cty., to present his company’s plans for a new mine in the area. Uranium prices have soared in recent years as new nuclear plants come online outside the U.S.

-- An important new report from the Electric Power Research Institute indicates that plug-in hybrid vehicles offer significant reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions – no matter what kind of electricity generation used to produce the power. The benefits of rechargeable cars come from the fact that using the battery cuts down on engine use around town, regardless of whether the power comes from a coal-fired plant or a solar farm.

-- The hot springs of Yellowstone have attracted and fascinated visitors for more than a century, and now it seems that they’ve produced a new wonder: a bacterium that converts light to energy. Reported in today’s issue of the influential journal Science, the discovery of “ a new kind of photosynthesis” could be important in determining how microbes efficiently harvest energy – with possible implications for future solar technology for humans.

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