Coal

Rush Island Energy Center has successfully fired Powder River Basin (PRB) coal for two decades, as proven by the plant’s excellent performance stats, dedication to minimizing its environmental footprint, and sterling safety record. The PRB Coal Users’ Group top award recognizes the plant staff’s long-term dedication to continuously improving its safe handling and efficient combustion […]

Projections that coal utilization will decline faster than previously forecast have spurred Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises (B&W) to shed 200 jobs and restructure its traditional power business that serves coal-fired power generation in a bid to reduce overhead and improve efficiency. The Charlotte, N.C.–based energy and environmental technology and service company said on June 28 […]

The world’s power sector last year emitted a third of global sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions, 14% of nitrogen oxides (NOx), and 5% of total particulate emissions (PM2.5), but those emission values have fallen drastically over the last decade even though coal power generation has seen a surge, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in a […]

The U.S., Mexico, and Canada today announced an unprecedented goal to procure 50% of North America’s total power generation from renewables, nuclear, carbon capture and storage (CCS), and energy efficiency technologies by 2025. President Obama, Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau, and the President of Mexico Enrique Peña Nieto, announced the continental goal, part of […]

Although it’s not widely publicized, a majority of the energy used to generate electricity is wasted in the form of heat discharged to the environment. For better or worse, that’s just the way a typical thermal power plant works. Fuel, such as coal, biomass, natural gas, or uranium (in the case of nuclear plants), is […]

Enrico Viale, head of global thermal generation for the Italian energy company Enel, kicked off an international power industry event yesterday with a keynote presentation describing the “needs” of utilities in the future.

Florida Light and Power (FPL) wants to buy and phase out another coal-fired power plant in Florida, a move it says will save its customers an estimated $129 million when new gas-fired infrastructure is built in the state. The NextEra subsidiary on June 20 filed a petition for the Florida Public Service Commission’s (PSC’s) approval […]

  The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has unveiled details of the Clean Energy Incentive Program (CEIP), a voluntary measure central to the judicially stalled Clean Power Plan that seeks to provide guidance to states and tribes that want to meet goals under the plan when it becomes effective. The final Clean Power Plan, finalized in […]

The importance of RTO maintenance
RTOs or Regenerative Thermal Oxidizers control emissions without producing harmful byproducts or hazardous waste. They help destroy volatile organic compounds (VOCs), hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) and other odorous emissions created during normal manufacturing and industrial processes by combusting them into carbon dioxide and water. RTOs pass hot exhaust gas and cooler

A Minnesota law that bans power imports from new out-of-state coal-fired power plants is unconstitutional, a federal appeals court has deemed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit on June 15 upheld a decision by the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota that found that the statute’s prohibitions had the effect […]

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) listed costs and time among several reasons for its preferred method to close its coal ash impoundments in place, rather than by removal, but the move has come under fire by environmental groups. The federally owned corporation earlier this month released a final environmental impact statement (EIS) to support its […]

Georgia Power will shut down and stop receiving coal ash at all 29 of its coal ash ponds within the next three years. The announcement on June 13 is the latest in a string of similar moves from coal plant–owning utilities across the nation in response to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) coal ash disposal […]

The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) controversial Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) survived another day as the U.S. Supreme Court on June 13 declined to review the D.C. Circuit’s decision to leave the rule in place while the EPA revises it to comply with a 2015 Supreme Court ruling. The 2015 decision sent MATS back […]

The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) approved Minnesota Power Co.’s integrated resource plan (IRP) on June 9, which calls for the economic idling of the company’s Taconite Harbor Energy Center—a two-unit 150-MW facility (Unit 3 was retired in June 2015)—this fall and ceasing coal operations at the site in 2020. The MPUC also adjusted the […]

One of the witnesses testifying before the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works on June 9 believes states and regulated entities will be granted additional time to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Clean Power Plan (CPP), if the rule is ultimately found to be lawful. Currently, the U.S. Supreme Court has […]

Michigan utility DTE Energy announced on June 8 that it would retire a total of eight aging coal-fired units at three of its plants by 2023. The units slated for retirement are located at the 651-MW River Rouge plant, the 536-MW Trenton Channel plant (Figure), and the 1,547-MW St. Clair plant. All three are located in […]

  Even though it may dominate forecasts, natural gas–fired generation faces a troubled expansion in the U.S., according to experts from a variety of stake-holding entities—including an industry group, a utility, a generator, and a pipeline company. Challenges that have few solutions—from price volatility, to gas transport concerns, to rule uncertainty—may upend the nation’s dependence […]

North Carolina’s governor has vetoed a coal ash bill backed by Duke Energy that would have reinstated the recently dissolved Coal Ash Management Commission. Senate Bill 71 (SB71), introduced in February 2015, has passed both houses. Some media sources suggest that lawmakers have enough votes to override the veto. The bill seeks to re-establish the […]

China unveiled its 13th Five-Year Plan this March. The official proposal that will guide the country’s economic and social development from 2016 through 2020 lays out targets and other measures to address a number of climate change, air pollution, and water policies that will build on progress to transform its power sector. The plan sets […]

The Environmental Protection Agency’s rule to regulate the disposal of coal combustion residuals as solid waste went into effect last fall. After evaluating the available solutions and technologies, here’s what some experts consider the safest and most effective approaches for complying with the rule and protecting the environment. A little over a year ago, the […]

Coal-fired power plants around the U.S. are closing—rapidly. It’s a trend that will continue for the foreseeable future as dozens more units are slated for closure in the next few years. According to a

Kansas City–based Great Plains Energy has agreed to purchase Westar Energy—Kansas’ largest electric utility—in a combined cash and stock transaction with an enterprise value of about $12.2 billion. The deal was announced on May 31. When complete, Westar will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Great Plains Energy, which also owns Kansas City Power and […]

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must halt its drive to help states supportive of the Clean Power Plan to comply with the rule because it defies the Supreme Court stay, the attorneys general for West Virginia and Texas have urged the agency. An April 28 request to the agency by 14 states seeking technical assistance […]

Talen Energy, which owns a portion of the Colstrip Power Plant in Montana and operates the plant for the five other utilities and holding companies that also own shares, told the other owners on May 23 that it plans to exit as operator by May 2018 because it is losing too much money. The huge […]

Phibro—an independent commodity merchant company based in Stamford, Conn.—through its affiliate Philipp Brothers Fertilizer, recently announced that it is acquiring a clean coal gasification plant just outside of West Terre Haute, Ind., from SG Solutions. The plant had been used to produce synthetic gas and steam to fuel the adjacent Wabash River Combined Cycle Plant, […]

Donald Trump, presumptive Republican nominee for president, has chosen a back-bench Republican congressman with a lot of experience in state energy regulation as his advisor on energy issues

Even if the final Clean Power Plan is not implemented, U.S. electricity-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions will remain well below 2005 levels, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in a comparison of two cases looking forward through 2040. The cases are part of the agency’s May 17–released Annual Energy Outlook 2016 Early Release (AEO2016 Early […]

The Department of Energy (DOE) is ready to end its involvement with the Texas Clean Energy Project (TCEP), a carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) facility under development in west Texas, a move that would effectively shut the project down, according to its backers. Along with FutureGen, Hydrogen Energy California (HECA), and NRG’s Petra Nova […]

Oral arguments to assess the merits of the Clean Power Plan will now take place before a nine-judge panel at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on September 27, bypassing review of challenges to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) controversial rule by a three-judge panel that was originally scheduled to […]