New Rules and Old Plants May Strain Summer Energy Supplies
By MATTHEW L. WALD
WASHINGTON — As 58 million people across 13 states sweated through the third day of a heat wave last month, power demand in North America’s largest regional grid jurisdiction hit a record high. And yet there was no shortage, no rolling blackout and no brownout in an area that stretches from Maryland to Chicago.
But that may not be the case in the future as stricter air quality rules are put in place. Eastern utilities satisfied demand that day — July 21 — with hefty output from dozens of 1950s and 1960s coal-burning power plants that dump prodigious amounts of acid gases, soot, mercury and arsenic into the air. Because of new Environmental Protection Agency rules, and some yet to be written, many of those plants are expected to close in coming years.
No one is sure yet how many or which ones will be shuttered or what the total lost output would be. And there is little agreement over how peak demand will be met in future summers.
The E.P.A. estimates that a rule on air toxins and mercury that it expects to complete in November will result in a loss of 10,000 megawatts — or almost 1 percent of the generating capacity in the United States. Electricity experts, however, say that rule, combined with forthcoming ones on coal ash and cooling water, will have a much greater effect — from 48,000 megawatts to 80,000 megawatts, or 3.5 to 7 percent. (NYT)
Obama’s War on Coal
Killing jobs, causing blackouts
By William Yeatman
Originally published in The New York Post
President Obama claims to see the need to create jobs at this time of endless 9-plus percent unemployment — yet his administration continues to relentlessly destroy jobs for ideological reasons. The best example may be the Obama Environmental Protection Agency’s “war on coal.”
The EPA’s regulatory crusade directly threatens hundreds of thousands of jobs — and “rolling blackouts” that threaten even more.
Start with a proposed regulation under the Clean Air Act that’s set to be finalized in November. The Utility MACT (“Maximum Achievable Control Technology”) rule seeks to cut US power plants’ emissions of mercury from 29 tons a year to just five. Yet EPA itself estimates that cutting even as much as 41 tons out of total emissions of 105 tons “is unlikely to substantially affect total risk.”
For zero benefit, the Utility MACT is one of the most expensive federal regulations ever. In comments submitted to the EPA, Unions for Jobs and the Environment, an alliance of unions representing more than 3.2 million workers, estimated that this needless regulation would jeopardize 251,000 jobs.
Then there’s EPA’s out-of-the-blue ruling last month, ordering Texas to cut emissions of sulfur dioxide by 47 percent. This, when the draft version of the Cross State Air Pollution Rule had exempted the state entirely. The excuse for the change? A supposed need to slightly reduce emissions as monitored 500 miles away in Madison County, Ill. — a locale that meets the EPA air-quality standards in question. (CEI)
U.S. Coal Exports To Europe Treble
Saturday, 13 August 2011 15:45 Ying Diao and Mathew Carr, Bloomberg
U.S. coal exports to the Netherlands jumped to 1.1 million tons from 334,628 tons. Shipments to Germany went to 899,009 tons from 166,314 tons. Trade to the U.K. rose to 852,159 tons from 159,280 tons.
The U.S. may increase coal exports, further boosting supply of the commodity in Europe, Macquarie Group Ltd. (MQG) said.
“A big push” to encourage natural-gas burning in the U.S. may drive up coal exports to Europe, China and India, said Hayden Atkins, an analyst in London at Macquarie’s commodities unit. The closing of Germany’s nuclear plants will increase demand in that nation, Atkins said.
U.S. steam-coal exports to Europe in the first quarter more than tripled from a year earlier to 4.9 million metric tons from 1.5 million tons, according to a report on the website of the U.S. Energy Information Administration. U.S. coal exports are at their highest level since 1992, it said.
Exports to the Netherlands jumped to 1.1 million tons from 334,628 tons. Shipments to Germany went to 899,009 tons from 166,314 tons. Trade to the U.K. rose to 852,159 tons from 159,280 tons. (GWPF)