DOE walks the clean coal talk / For Swedish nuke, a case of mistaken identity / Siemens completes big CHP plant / E.ON bets big on coal / BP Solar expands Maryland plant / GE scores big turbine deals / PSNH switches from coal to wood / EPRI tests solid-state current limiter / POWER digest

Mandatory standards advance / To drain or not to drain / Practical aspects of burning landfill gas / Time management

U.S. demand for natural gas is projected to increase by more than 50% by 2020. Companies are building—and the public is opposing—receiving terminals on three coasts that would increase imports of liquefied natural gas. The pros and cons of "opening up" Alaska, coastal waters, and federal lands to drilling are still being debated. These politically […]

Forecasting the direction of the U.S. electric power industry for 2007, much less the distant future, is like defining a velocity vector; doing so requires a direction and speed to delineate progress. In this special report, POWER’s first stab at prognostication, the editors look at current industry indicators and draw conclusions based on their more than 100 years of experience. To borrow verbatim the title of basketball legend Charles Barkley’s book: I May Be Wrong but I Doubt It.

Following the money invested in projects is a viable way to compare growth trends for power projects using the four major generation types: coal, natural gas, nuclear, and renewable.

Layering NOx control technologies can reduce a coal-fired unit’s NOx emissions to levels achievable by selective catalytic reduction alone. Advanced Combustion Technology Inc. (ACT) (www.advancedcombustion.net) has demonstrated that using several in combination can cut emissions from boilers firing eastern bituminous coal or No. 6 oil to less than 0.15 lb/mmBtu. The following two case studies […]

Large-particle ash (LPA), also called popcorn ash (Figure 1), is a serious concern for many coal-fired utility boiler operators who have retrofitted their unit(s) with a high-dust selective catalytic reduction (SCR) system. LPA formed in the boiler can easily carry over into the SCR reactor (Figure 2), where it often causes catalyst erosion damage and […]

The February 1907 issue of POWER magazine reported on the construction of a new coal-fired steam engine plant on the Merrimac River outside of Lawrence, Mass. According to the plant’s owner, "the simplest and most flexible means for handling coal… to the furnace is by animal muscle… that brings the coal to the firing floor […]

When Charles Dickens began A Tale of Two Cities with, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," he was referring to the French Revolution of the late 18th century. But Dickens’ words apply equally well to the American generation industry of the late 20th century. A decade of overbuilding U.S. […]

To borrow shamelessly from Charles Dickens, one of my favorite authors, for coal in 2006, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." No Escape The year began in horror. On January 2, most likely a result of a severe lightning strike, methane gas in the International Coal Group’s Sago Mine […]