In This Issue
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CoalEPA Considers Regulating Coal Ash Ponds
The Environmental Protection Agency has ordered a review of some 300 U.S. utility coal combustion waste sites and said it will develop new regulations to ensure that incidents like December’s colossal coal ash spill in Kingston, Tenn., are not repeated.
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Coal
EPA to Reconsider Setting CO2 Standard for New Power Plants
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson has said that the EPA will reconsider a controversial policy memorandum issued by the agency late last year stating that the agency would not establish a carbon dioxide emission standard for new power plants and other large industrial sources of the heat-trapping gas.
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Coal
Obama Answers Critics of Climate Allowance Auction
In the face of growing criticism from congressional Democrats of his plan to require electric utilities and other industries to pay for greenhouse gas emission allowances, President Obama told business leaders he is willing to negotiate on the issue, but warned that broad, free allowance allocations would mask the carbon price signal economists say is crucial to speed the deployment of clean technologies needed to fight global warming.
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CoalCFB Technology Offers Short- and Long-Term Environmental and Power Generation Benefits
Circulating fluidized bed technology has the potential to significantly reduce carbon emissions when burning coal and adds the additional flexibility of burning other renewable fuels. Foster Wheeler’s Flexi-Burn technology allows the CFB to produce a CO2-rich flue gas and be part of a practical carbon capture and storage solution.
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O&MBalanced Pipe Fuel Flow Is Not Enough for Uniform Combustion
Conventional wisdom tells us that the key to good boiler combustion requires carefully balancing the fuel-air ratios across all the coal pipes. Recent tests show that the uniformity of the burner-to-burner stoichiometries—not balanced pipe-to-pipe fuel flow distributions—dictates combustion uniformity.
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O&MDominion Solves Mt. Storm’s Fuel-Handling Problems with Improved Coal Silo Design
Many coal-fired power stations built before 1980 were designed for handling relatively easy-handling lump coal. If your plant’s bins, bunkers, and silos aren’t up to dealing with today’s range of more variable coal properties, this case study shows one way to minimize coal flow problems.
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Commentary
A U.S. Cap-and-Trade Sytem Could Be “Mostly Dead” on Arrival
President Obama’s recent comments to the Business Roundtable included two blunders that showed his misunderstanding of the fundamentals of the cap-and-trade approach to reducing carbon emissions that is the centerpiece of his 2010 budget request.
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Commentary
Stimulus VAR Support
Can clean energy investments carry their important share of the U.S. Recovery and Reinvestment Act load? Here’s a contrarian answer: It’s up to the utility industry and its regulators.