POWERnews

The $3.5 billion Taylorville Energy Center (TEC), a hybrid integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plant proposed for Illinois by Tenaska and MDL Holding Co., has been selected by the U.S. Department of Energy for final term-sheet negotiations under its loan guarantee program.

UK business group CBI on Monday released a report warning that the country’s current policy of incentivizing investments in wind power would result in too little investment in other forms of low-carbon energy, such as nuclear and clean coal. The approach will make energy security harder to achieve, and it could jeopardize the UK’s ability to meet climate change targets, the group said.

Fifteen environmental groups and a western Colorado county last week filed suit against the federal Departments of the Interior, Agriculture, and Energy, saying that the government’s “sprawling, hopscotch network” of 6,000 miles and 3.2 million acres of federal land designated as electricity transmission corridors promote coal- and gas-fired power generation, not renewable generation from sources like solar and wind.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is preparing to conduct what it says is the world’s first large-scale project to design, build, and test a warm gas cleanup system to remove multiple contaminants from coal-derived syngas. The federal agency has teamed with Research Triangle Institute (RTI) International, a scientific research firm, to demonstrate the 50-MW system at Tampa Electric Co.’s 250-MW integrated gasification combined-cycle (IGCC) power plant.

The Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works kicked off efforts to pass climate change and energy legislation in a general hearing on Tuesday, presenting a variety of perspectives on a potential federal cap-and-trade program.

The Georgia Court of Appeals on Tuesday reversed a lower court ruling that had rejected an air pollution permit for the planned $2 billion Longleaf Energy Station in southwest Georgia because it did not set limits on carbon dioxide emissions.

The Department of Energy (DOE) last week issued $59 million in conditional loan guarantees to Beacon Power Corp. and Nordic Windpower, while USEC said on Monday it expects to receive a loan guarantee for its American Centrifuge Plant by early August.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has officially scrapped the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) program, a Bush administration initiative to promote nuclear technologies while reducing the impacts associated with nuclear fuel disposal and proliferation risks.

T. Boone Pickens has postponed plans for a multibillion-dollar project to build the world’s biggest wind farm in Texas, citing funding and transmission issues.

Duke Energy has filed testimony with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission for a proposed project that would store a portion of carbon dioxide emissions from its Edwardsport coal gasification power plant underground in southwest Indiana.

Federal agencies will work with western leaders to designate tracts of U.S. public lands in the West as prime zones for utility-scale solar energy development, fund environmental studies, open new solar energy permitting offices, and speed reviews of industry proposals, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said on Monday.

GE Energy and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) last week agreed to co-develop a “next generation” steam turbine for use in gas turbine combined-cycle power plants. If successful, the parties will separately manufacture and sell the co-developed steam turbine.

An Arkansas appeals court last week overturned on technical grounds a key decision by the state regulators that authorized construction of Southwestern Electric Power Co.’s (SWEPCO’s) 600-MW John W. Turk Jr. coal-fired power plant in Hempstead County—the nation’s first ultrasupercritical project. SWEPCO on Monday filed an appeal with the Arkansas Supreme Court and said it would continue the plant’s construction because delays could prove costly.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed by a narrow vote of 219–212 a mammoth climate change and energy bill on Friday that, among other things, seeks to establish a carbon emissions reduction goal, a cap-and-trade program, and a federal renewable energy standard. The bill now heads to the Senate.

The Ontario government has suspended a 10-year multibillion dollar nuclear upgrade project to replace two reactors at the Darlington site, citing pricing and uncertainty regarding the future of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL), Canada’s sole bidder.

Exelon, the largest nuclear power generator in the U.S., has suspended plans to build a proposed two-unit nuclear plant in Victoria, Texas, because of uncertainties in the domestic economy and limited federal loan guarantees.

The breach of a 50-year-old coal ash storage pond and subsequent ash spill at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA’s) Kingston Fossil Plant in Roane County, Tenn., last December was caused by a rare and complex combination of conditions, a six-month independent engineering study has found. These included the existence of an unusual bottom layer of ash and silt, the high water content of the wet ash, the increasing height of ash, and the construction of sloping dikes over the wet ash.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last week cleared by a 15–8 vote a broad energy bill that, among other things, would impose a federal renewable energy standard, reaffirm the government’s commitment to nuclear waste disposal, and implement grid cybersecurity measures.

There is no credible pathway toward prudent greenhouse gas stabilization targets without carbon dioxide emissions reductions from existing coal power plants, but the U.S. urgently needs technology options for these plants and policies that incentivize implementation, a new study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) finds.

Duke Energy is planning a new nuclear power plant at the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Portsmouth site in Piketon, Ohio, the company announced with partners AREVA, USEC Inc., UniStar Nuclear Energy, and the Southern Ohio Diversification Initiative (SODI) on Thursday.

The week brought news of key alliances around the world concerning important fossil fuel–fired projects with carbon capture potential.

California regulators on Friday approved a program that seeks to generate 500 MW of solar power through the deployment of thousands of solar photovoltaic (PV) panels on large commercial rooftops across Southern California. The approval marks the first time a California utility will own a significant renewable energy source.

A national assessment of demand response released by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Thursday estimates that up to 20% of peak electricity use in the U.S. can be cut through programs in which customers agree to curb consumption at times of high demand.

SkyFuel Inc. has signed an agreement with Sunray Energy Inc., a subsidiary of Cogentrix Energy, for the installation of SkyTrough collectors at Sunray’s 43-MW parabolic trough generating plant near Daggett, Calif.,

Canada last week marked a major milestone in its move toward establishing a national carbon market by laying down the rules for a federal greenhouse gas offset system.

A report released on Monday by the Western Governors’ Association (WGA) and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) as part of the Western Renewable Energy Zones (WREZ) initiative identifies 36 areas in the Western Interconnection that have the potential both for large-scale development of renewable resources and low environmental impacts.

China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) last week halted construction of two major hydroelectric projects on the Jinsha River for inadequate environmental reviews. The order has thrown into question a 200 billion yuan (US$29.2 billion) investment in hydro projects along the middle reaches of the river.

A superior court judge from Maricopa County, Ariz., has accepted jurisdiction to decide whether the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC), a state regulatory body, has constitutional and statutory authority to adopt and implement renewable energy standards across the state.

The Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) announced support for the FutureGen project on Friday resurrected hopes for the Illinois gasified coal power plant and carbon capture initiative from which the Bush administration abruptly withdrew last year. If a decision is made to move forward with construction in 2010, however, the Mattoon, Ill., project will be initially designed for 60% carbon capture—not 90% as originally intended—and to gasify a single coal type.

Overshadowed by news that FutureGen—the nation’s first commercial-scale coal-fired carbon capture and storage (CCS) project—had regained the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) backing, the DOE’s financial awards on Friday to nine smaller projects that will develop precombustion carbon capture technologies for future integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plants went almost unnoticed.