POWERnews

The German state governing council of Hesse last week partially approved a 1.1-GW coal-fired power plant proposed for construction by Germany firm E.ON at its Staudinger site. If E.ON receives clearance for actual operation of the plant, the plant will be the sixth block at the site, replacing three older units built in the 1960s and 1970s.

A novel technology that could help release some currently unusable energy in an estimated 2 billion tons of coal waste in the U.S. has been demonstrated by a Department of Energy–supported project, the federal body said on Tuesday.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) last week said it had published its final Safety Evaluation Report (SER) for the Mixed-Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility at Savannah River.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) last month approved Constellation Energy’s $1.1 billion acquisition of BostonGen’s five power plants in the Boston area, which have a combined capacity of 2,950 MW. The approval marks closing of the sale of the third-largest generating portfolio in the New England region.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued its plan for establishing greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution standards under the Clean Air Act in 2011. The agency looked at a number of sectors and is moving forward on GHG standards for fossil fuel power plants and petroleum refineries—two of the largest industrial sources, representing nearly 40% of the GHG pollution in the U.S.

The General Electric Co. (GE) agreed last week to requirements established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for final cleanup of PCB-contaminated sediment in the Hudson River. The second phase of the cleanup is to begin in late spring.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced on Dec. 23 that a $17.1 million loan guarantee has been finalized for the AES Westover facility. The loan guarantee will support the construction of a 20- MW energy storage system using advanced lithium-ion batteries.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced last Wednesday that it is accepting applications for a total of up to $74 million to support the research and development (R&D) of clean, reliable fuel cells for stationary and transportation applications.

In a news conference hosted today by the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP), presenters argued that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has overstated the economic benefits of recycling coal ash by more than 20 times and exaggerated the potential stigma on recycled fly ash that could result from tougher coal ash regulations. At the same time, the EPA is vastly underemphasizing the costs to human and environmental health of not regulating the substance, presenters said.

On Thursday, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) voted 9-1 to adopt a cap-and-trade program for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that is scheduled to start in 2012. The program will affect power plants and other industrial facilities that emit carbon dioxide.