POWERnews

Regulators from six states shared starkly different views on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) proposed carbon rules for existing power plants at a House hearing on Tuesday. Some state-level officials said the EPA’s overall emission targets and suggested means to achieve them are based on unworkable and unrealistic assumptions about how state and regional power […]

The coal supply picture for Midwest power plants darkened again this summer as deliveries of Powder River Basin (PRB) coal to the region fell for a second consecutive quarter due to unreliable rail service, according to a report by SNL Energy. Midwest generators have been plagued by coal supply issues this year because of ongoing […]

The U.S. added 1,146 MW of utility-scale solar generation in the first half of 2014—the most ever for a first- and second-quarter period—but natural gas continued to lead new additions, though its margin may be shrinking, according to Energy Information Administration (EIA) data. Through the first six months of 2014, the U.S. added 2,179 MW […]

The Montana Public Service Commission (MPSC) on Sept. 4 approved Northwestern Energy Corp.’s request to purchase 11 hydroelectric power plants in the state from PPL Montana for $880 million. The plants, which comprise PPL Montana’s entire hydroelectric profile, total 630 MW of generation. Nine are run-of-river plants; the other two, the Mystic Lake Dam in […]

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Tuesday granted the nation’s first four Class VI underground injection permits for carbon sequestration to the federally backed FutureGen 2.0 carbon-capture-and-storage (CCS) project.  The Department of Energy formally committed $1 billion to the $1.68 billion project being developed by the FutureGen Industrial Alliance, a coalition of coal producers, users, […]

The European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) under construction in Finland may not start operating until late 2018—putting the project nearly 10 years behind its initial schedule.  Finnish utility Teollisuuden Voima (TVO) said in a statement on Sept. 1 that the AREVA-Siemens consortium building Olkiluoto 3 had updated its schedule. The schedule review, which “has been going […]

On Aug. 28, the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) approved an emergency order allowing Florida Power & Light (FPL) to divert water from the district’s L-31E Canal system to help moderate unusually high temperatures and salinity that are occurring in the Turkey Point cooling canal system (CCS). The CCS—an approximately 5,900-acre network of unlined […]

Revised national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for ozone that are expected from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) this December will likely be stricter.  Agency staff from the Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards in a 597-page final policy assessment released on Aug. 29 recommend revising the standard to within a range of 60 […]

Nearly four years to the day after eight people were killed in a natural gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, two judges of the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) ruled on Sept. 2 that Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) must pay a record $1.4 billion in fines and penalties for its role in the disaster. […]

The El Arrayán Wind facility—located about 250 miles north of Santiago on the Chilean coast—was officially opened on Aug. 26 during a ceremony that included Chile’s president, Michelle Bachelet. “El Arrayán is the biggest wind farm in Chile and we are pleased at what we can achieve when we use the natural resources the earth […]