How Wisconsin regulators 'tax' renewable energy

Michael Vickerman's commentary in Midwest Energy News on the recent changes in WI renewable energy. Find the original post here.

Commentary: How Wisconsin regulators ‘tax’ renewable energy

RENEW Wisconsin's Michael Vickerman

Starting next January, the price of purchasing renewable energy voluntarily through monthly utility bills will spike to all-time highs, thanks to recent decisions rendered by the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (PSCW) on two popular “green pricing” programs.

The thousands of Madison Gas & Electric (MGE) customers participating in the utility’s Green Power Tomorrow program will see their premiums jump from 2.5 cents/kWh to 4 cents/kWh. That’s an increase of 60 percent. To translate this into dollars and cents, an average MGE customer consuming 500 kWh of electricity per month and subscribing at the 100 percent level will pay $90 more in 2013 for the same amount of renewable kWh sold this year.

Residential customers of Milwaukee-based We Energies (WE) will see an even larger percentage increase next year. In that utility’s rate case, the PSCW jacked up the premium paid by Energy for Tomorrow subscribers by nearly 73 percent, from 1.39 cents to 2.4 cents/kWh. Energy for Tomorrow has more than 20,000 subscribers.

Back in 1999, the year both programs were launched, MGE and WE customers paid an extra 3.33 cents and 2.04 cents/kWh, respectively, for the renewable energy they sponsored. Come January 1st, MGE and WE will likely share the dubious distinction of being the only utilities in the country offering renewable energy at a higher rate than they did in the 1990’s. So much for progress.

Adding insult to injury, renewable program subscribers will be subject to general rate increases approved by the PSCW this November. The utilities sought higher rates to recover the costs of retrofitting older coal-fired power stations with modern pollution controls. The fact that the renewable generators leveraged by program participants will never need pollution control retrofits is wholly disregarded in determining the size of the premium.

This is unquestionably a subsidy that flows from program participants to all ratepayers.

How did this happen?
Since 1999, renewable generation costs have tumbled, while productivity has improved.
A frustrated program subscriber might well ask: If base utility rates are going up, and the cost of renewable electricity is declining, why are premiums going up instead of down?

The short answer is that wholesale electricity prices have sagged in recent years, owing to a combination of unsustainably low natural gas prices, stagnant demand, and rapid expansion of wind power displacing higher-cost generation. In contrast, the price of renewable energy procured under long-term contracts held steady. When prices dropped in the wholesale market beginning in late 2008, the gap between system energy and renewable sources widened.

Though accurate, the above explanation is deeply unsatisfying, because the wholesale “market” is concerned about one thing only: the marginal cost of producing electricity into the grid. Nothing else matters, including the expenditures approved by the PSCW to reduce emissions from older generators. Even though retail customers wind up footing the bill for those upgrades, the wholesale market does not treat pollution control retrofits as marginal costs. Not one cent paid by ratepayers for these expenditures is reflected in the prices that renewable generators compete against.

The net effect of this disconnect is to artificially suppress the price of electricity from older and dirtier generators relative to newer and cleaner electricity producers. Real markets factor in the cost of upgrading and replacing capital equipment that manufacture the product bought by customers. What we have instead is an artificial contrivance that sacrifices long-term considerations like clean air, resource diversity and regulatory risk for the short-term reward of low prices.

Indeed, it would be difficult to design a more punitive market structure for renewables than the one we have at present.

‘Swimming up a waterfall’
Pricing renewable energy against a market operating in real time also undermines a valuable attribute of renewable energy, namely its inherent price stability. In this environment, the only way a customer can directly benefit from a fixed-price energy source like solar is to self-generate at his or her premises to reduce consumption of grid-supplied electricity.

In setting the premium size, the PSCW relied on pricing data at a time when the regional wholesale market was near its cyclical bottom. Electricity prices are now edging upward as forward prices of natural gas have rebounded from historic lows earlier this year. It’s a safe bet that wholesale electricity prices will continue to increase in 2013.

This sets up the very real possibility that WE and MGE will collect more revenue than is necessary to cover the cost spread between system energy and the renewable energy supplies servicing their customers. Unfortunately, the next time the base premium for each utility can be adjusted is January 1, 2015.

For at least a century now, fossil fuels have been the default resource option for most utilities. Against this institutional bias, switching to renewable energy is akin to swimming upstream. But given how far backward the PSCW bent to accommodate utilities’ continued reliance on coal and natural gas, quite a few renewable energy subscribers may balk at the prospect of swimming up a waterfall.

In fairness to MGE and WE, the price hikes approved by the PSCW went well beyond the incremental increases proposed by the two utilities. That’s because the agency relies solely on the wholesale “market” metric described above that filters out all societal benefits from the equation. To the agency, renewables are another source of electrons that deserve no special consideration. And, in reaching its decision, the PSCW disregarded the potential impact that abrupt price hikes might have on customer participation.

Programs outliving their usefulness?
A significant loss in subscribership would be a regrettable outcome if the programs were still viable vehicles for leveraging new sources of renewable energy. Sadly, that is no longer the case.

Earlier this decade, WE and MGE pulled the plug on a popular feature of their programs, specifically the special solar energy buyback rates that were funded with participant dollars. This innovation, which spurred the installation of hundreds of solar electric systems in their territories, succeeded in elevating MGE and WE’s stature while achieving the aims of their participating customers. However, when the utilities eliminated their solar incentives, they also removed the principal rationale for subscribing to their programs.

It seems quite clear that the current crop of voluntary renewable energy programs have outlived their usefulness. They are stagnating under a market structure that distorts and amplifies their true costs as well as a regulatory climate that greatly discounts their benefits to ratepayers. What were once dynamic vehicles for increasing supplies of renewable energy are now little more than feel-good marketing exercises running on autopilot. The value proposition to customers just isn’t there anymore.

There is nothing out there to prevent utilities from revitalizing their green pricing programs and making them useful once again. Such an undertaking, however, would require them to do something they haven’t done before: present an affirmative case for adding more renewables into their energy mix.

To do that effectively, utilities would need to recognize that the fossil energy path leads to a dead-end and that renewables ought to be the default resource option going forward. From that starting point, designing a program in which modest customer premiums actually result in additional supplies of renewable energy should be a simple and straightforward exercise.

It’s the very least a responsible utility should do to reduce the impact of generating electricity on the one planet we are privileged to call home.

Michael Vickerman is program and policy director of RENEW Wisconsin, a sustainable energy advocacy organization. RENEW Wisconsin is a member of RE-AMP, which also publishes Midwest Energy News.

Find the original article post here.

India's Blackout Lesson: Coal Failed, Small Solar = Big Results

From a story by Justin Guay, Sierra Club International Program:

Of course they still have to face the problems they have inherited from trying to copy/paste a centralized grid from the West. So what can they do to solve peak problems with the grid they already have in place? Deploy lots and lots of distributed solar and efficiency.

That's because, unlike coal, solar for the most part is available when you need it - during peak hours. Which is why it's great to see States like Gujarat taking the lead in roof top solar programs with the support of the IFC. And efficiency makes the peaks smaller so you need less power in the first place.

The irony here of course is that distributed generation has always been ignored as trivial compared to the real need for a large scale 'modern grid.' That’s because policymakers and commentators lack the imagination to understand the fact that when aggregated, small can be very, very big.

Take the hidden truth behind India's modern grid (as my colleague Jigar Shah points out): it is actually already a distributed system that is largely powered by filthy, costly diesel gen sets. That’s because power outages are so frequent that businesses and wealthy individuals have been forced to pay for this backup generation to ensure power. This is a tremendous opportunity for companies seeking targeted diesel replacement strategies to save people and companies tremendous amounts of money, while providing reliable power.

Only 20, not 200, years of coal; we have to move "so fast" to get to 100% renewables

Leslie Glustrom is the featured speaker at RENEW's Energy Policy Summit, January 13, Madison. Read the report that she mentions about 11 minutes into the interview.

Register and get details about the Summit at the Summit Web page.

Coal Critic Coming to Madison to Speak on Effective Renewable Energy Advocacy, January 13, 2012

For immediate release
December 7, 2011

More information
Michael Vickerman
608.255.4044
mvickerman@renewwisconsin.org

Leslie Glustrom, research director of Colorado-based Clean Energy Action, and an unwavering critic of utility reliance on coal for electricity generation, will be the featured speaker at RENEW Wisconsin’s Energy Policy Summit.

The Summit will be held on Friday, January 13, 2012, at the University of Wisconsin-Extension’s Pyle Center located on the UW-Madison campus. Summit attendees will spend the day discussing and selecting renewable energy strategies that make sense in the current political environment in Wisconsin. More information on the Summit can be found on the RENEW Wisconsin website at http://www.renewwisconsin.org.

As research director, Glustrom authored in 2009 an extensively referenced report on U.S. coal supplies titled, “Coal—Cheap and Abundant—Or Is It? Why Americans Should Stop Assuming that the US has a 200-Year Supply of Coal,” available for free at http://www.cleanenergyaction.org.

Since 2009, Glustrom has traveled to numerous states helping them to understand the likely constraints on their coal supplies.

Glustrom’s on-going research illuminates a future in which coal prices will likely continue to escalate, driven by a combination of less accessible coal supplies, increasing demand from Asian countries, and rising diesel fuel costs for hauling coal to distant markets like Wisconsin.

Clean Energy Action is spearheading a campaign to shut down Colorado’s coal-fired power plants and replace them with locally generated renewable electricity.

“Leslie’s experiences with Clean Energy Action can help Wisconsin renewable energy advocates formulate effective strategies for 2012 and beyond,” said Michael Vickerman, executive director of RENEW Wisconsin, a statewide sustainable energy advocacy organization headquartered in Madison.

“Even though Colorado is a coal-producing state, it has adopted some of the most aggressive policies in the country for advancing renewable energy,” said Vickerman. “Colorado’s commitment to clean energy is driving its economy at a time when its coal output is diminishing. For example, Vestas, the world’s largest manufacturer of wind turbines with four plants employing 1,700 people in Colorado, supplied 90 turbines this year to Wisconsin’s largest wind project, the Glacier Hills Wind Park in Columbia County.”

“Leslie will inspire us to reverse the retreat from renewables and retake the initiative going forward,” Vickerman said.

In Boulder, Glustrom was part of the team that led the successful 2010 and 2011 ballot initiatives allowing Boulder to move ahead with plans to municipalize and break away from the long term commitment to coal plants made by their incumbent utility, Xcel Energy.

-- END --

WP&L and WPS warn of higher rates because of pollution rules

From an article by Tom Content published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on August 19:

Two state utilities said this week new federal pollution rules will lead to higher electricity costs come January.

Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of Green Bay said its residential customers can expect an increase of more than $4 a month next year, including about $2 linked to the new rules designed to limit air pollution from coal-fired power plants.

The utility said it would see higher costs of about $32.6 million in 2012 from the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule that was finalized recently by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. That will result in rates going up by 6.8% instead of 3.4%, the utility said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last month finalized stronger regulations for Wisconsin and 26 other states aimed at curbing air pollution from long-distance sources.

Environmental groups praised the new rule because it would reduce acid rain and air pollution as well as help curb health effects from dirty air linked to coal plants. The EPA projected the rule will save up to 34,000 lives a year and prevent more than 400,000 asthma attacks as well as 19,000 admissions to hospitals. . .

The new rule has been in development for several years but the first phase of compliance hits utilities in 2012. WPS said it won't have time to install pollution controls by next year at its plants, but will be able to comply by purchasing credits from other utilities that have cut emissions.

The utility also said it plans to operate its coal plants less next year than it otherwise would have, and will buy more power from the Midwest wholesale power market as a result, a move that it said is also a factor in higher costs for customers. . . .

On Thursday [August 18], Wisconsin Power & Light Co. [Alliant] of Madison said it would face an additional $9 million in costs linked to the air pollution rule. With the change, the utility is now seeking an increase in 2012 of $20 million, or 2%, utility finance manager Martin Seitz said in a filing with state regulators.

Todd Stuart, executive director of the Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group, criticized the increases, and he noted that large energy users like paper mills will see higher than average increases, compared with homeowners and small businesses. Paper mills served by WPS could see a 9% hike, he said. . . .

"Industry always cries wolf whenever EPA tries to reduce air pollution," said Katie Nekola, lawyer with the conservation group Clean Wisconsin. "The fact is, the new rule will affect old, inefficient, unnecessary coal plants that should have been shut down long ago. The continued operation of those old units is costing ratepayers money, but you don't hear industry complaining about that."

Wisconsin Cannot Afford to Ignore Rising Coal Prices

For immediate release

More information
RENEW Wisconsin
Michael Vickerman
608.255.4044
mvickerman@renewwisconsin.org

Wisconsin Cannot Afford to Ignore Rising Coal Prices

Long-considered an inexpensive and reliable fuel source, coal has become subject to market and regulatory pressures that threaten to make it an expensive and risky way to generate electricity, according to national news reports and pertinent utility filings with the Wisconsin Public Service Commission (PSC).

“The expectation of continued increases in coal prices reinforces the value of relying on Wisconsin’s own energy resources. If there’s an effort to find savings for utility customers, the logical move would be to shutter antiquated coal plants before they become more of a liability,” said Michael Vickerman, Executive Director of RENEW Wisconsin, a statewide, nonprofit renewable energy advocacy organization.

A key driver behind coal’s rising cost is China, which has moved from an exporter to an importer of coal. The New York Times (NYT) reported last week that Chinese coal imports will hit all-time highs for November and December of this year. Some of this coal is coming from Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, the coal field that also supplies many Wisconsin power plants.¹

In the New York Times story, an executive from Peabody Energy, the world’s largest private coal company, predicted that his company will send larger and larger quantities of coal to China in the coming years.

Further adding to the upward price pressure on coal is the rising cost of diesel fuel. The PSC has estimated that half of the delivered cost of coal in Wisconsin is attributable to rail shipment, that is highly sensitive to the price of diesel fuel, which sells for 38 cents more per gallon than it did a year ago, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.² Tom Whipple, editor of the Peak Oil Review, expects diesel fuel supplies to tighten in 2011 as a consequence of flat production volumes and increasing demand from Asia.³ This phenomenon could affect Wisconsin electric utility rates as early as January 2011, according to Vickerman.

We Energies’ coal costs have escalated by $57 million, of which transportation costs account for almost $33 million, according to the utility’s most recent rate filing with the PSC. On top of that, We Energies expects to pay an additional $8 million in oil surcharge costs.4

Click to continue

Coal used to power “greenest” campus in state

From an article by Dustin Klein in The Pointer, UW-Stevens Point:

Many students would agree that the UW-Stevens point campus is very eco-friendly. Those same students might not know that UWSP burns coal at the physical plant on the north end of campus.


Joseph Rohrer, a sophomore forestry major, felt it speaks volumes about our university.

“Obviously, I’m not happy about [burning coal]. We’re supposed to be the greenest campus in the state, so it really says something about the other campuses,” he said.

The plant is used to heat the campus’ water and buildings, which is why it needs to burn its fuel. The physical plant runs all day long, despite rumors that it only runs at night.

According to Bob Govett, a 20-year veteran of the College of Natural Resources, the State of Wisconsin and the University work out a contract on the materials they burn. It comes in three different possibilities: coal, wood pellets, or natural gas. The decision about what to burn comes down to one thing: money. The campus burns the cheapest fuel available at the time.

“The coal is purchased under state contract, paper pellets under state contract, and the gas, again, is purchased under state contract,” Govett stated.

Wind generation reduces climate-changing emissions

From a report titled "The Facts about Wind Energy’s Emissions Savings" prepared by the American Wind Energy Association:

. . . four of the seven major independent grid operators in the
U.S. have studied the emissions impact of adding wind energy to their power grids, and all four have found that adding wind energy drastically reduces emissions of carbon dioxide and other harmful pollutants. While the emissions savings depend somewhat on the existing share of coal-fired versus gas-fired generation in the region, as one would expect, it is impossible to dispute the findings of these four independent grid operators that adding wind energy to their grids has significantly reduced emissions. . . .

DOE data show that wind and other renewables’ share of Texas’s electric mix increased from 1.3% in 2005 to 4.4% in 2008, an increase in share of 3.1 percentage points. During that period, electric sector carbon dioxide emissions declined by 3.3%, even though electricity use actually increased by 2% during that time. Because of wind energy, the state of Texas was able to turn what would have been a carbon emissions increase into a decrease of 8,690,000 metric tons per year, equal to the emissions savings of taking around 1.5 million cars off the road.

Stevens Point spent over $1.5 million on energy usage in 2009

From an article by Nick Paulson in the Stevens Point Journal:

Stevens Point in 2009 spent more than $1.5 million on energy, used more than 73,000 million BTUs and emitted more than 21 million pounds of carbon dioxide, according to an inventory taken by the city.

As the city develops and implements a plan to cut its energy use, that inventory will be used as a benchmark with which to compare future use.

Where the biggest problems are depends on what the city's goal ultimately is: decreasing energy use, energy cost or carbon emissions.

Sustainability coordinator Joe Kottwitz said the Stevens Point Energy Team, which is creating the plan, hasn't decided specifically which to focus on yet. However, decreasing one likely will have positive effects on the others.

"If we use less energy and less electricity, odds are the taxpayers and ratepayers will receive those benefits," said Mayor Andrew Halverson, who also is a member of the team.

Regardless of which avenue the city chooses, the primary focus likely will be electricity, which has the highest consumption (41 percent), cost (64 percent) and carbon dioxide emissions (71 percent) in the city.

That is because the electricity comes from coal-fueled power plants, Kottwitz said, which kick out a lot of emissions. Lighting is the most expensive use of energy for the city, costing almost $1 million, partially because it is powered by electricity, and partially because about half the streetlights are owned by Wisconsin Public Service, which charges a maintenance fee in addition to electricity fees.

State should study impact of biomass plant

From an editorial in the Wausau Daily Herald:

The group of citizens who are working to stop a proposed biomass plant near the Domtar paper mill in Rothschild have been working to cast doubt on virtually all of the claims made about the project -- environmental claims, economic claims and so on.

Of their concerns, the questions around the plant's environmental impact are the most serious, because the air emissions have the potential to do the most harm.

Domtar and We Energies have answered them in some detail, and we have no reason to doubt their analysis of the plant's impact. Still, there's no getting around the fact that those companies have an economic incentive to spin the facts in a way that is most beneficial to their project.

That's why we all would benefit from an environmental impact statement on the project by the state and federal governments. It would provide a solid and independent expert analysis of the project.

The regulations governing these projects are arcane, but the essence of the argument is easy to understand: The state Public Service Commission, sometimes in conjunction with the Department of Natural Resources and federal agencies, has the capacity to prepare an independent assessment of the real environmental effects of the proposed project. This includes the impact of emissions, noise and other factors.

By statute, that analysis is automatically triggered for any power plant generating 100 megawatts or more. The proposed biomass plant will generate 50 megawatts, so an environmental impact statement is not required.

That doesn't mean it shouldn't be completed. Fifty megawatts of electricity still is a major power plant. An environmental impact statement would add an important expert perspective to the local discussion about the plant. This is a big project, and a relatively new technology. It bears scrutiny.

Report: Coal use saps Wisconsin's economy

From an article by Larry Bivins in the Stevens Point Journal:

WASHINGTON -- Wisconsin is the nation's fifth most coal-dependent state for generating electricity, according to a report released this week.

Because the state has no coal supplies of its own, it spends hundreds of millions of dollars a year to import the fuel for power generation. Coal imports accounted for 68 percent of all power used in the state in 2008, research by the Union of Concerned Scientists found.
Wisconsin spent $853 million in 2008, or $152 per person, to import 25 million tons of coal from nine states, according to the report released Tuesday.

The state ranked 12th in the amount spent and in the amount of coal imported. Wyoming, which provided 40 percent of all U.S. coal in 2008, received $702 million of Wisconsin's money.

Coal-fired plants are the nation's biggest source of carbon dioxide, the primary greenhouse gas that leading scientists say is causing global warming. Carbon dioxide emissions pose a danger to public health as well as the environment.

The Union of Concerned Scientists report, "Burning Coal, Burning Cash: Ranking the States that Import the Most Coal," covers 38 states that are net importers of domestic and foreign coal. Those states spent $27.7 billion on domestic and foreign coal imports in 2008, the latest year for which figures were available from the U.S. Energy Department.
Wyoming, West Virginia and Kentucky produce most of the domestic coal burned in U.S. plants.

The report's authors conclude that all states would be better served if the money spent on coal were diverted to the development of renewable energy and energy-efficiency programs.

Weston 4 power plant must cut particulate pollution

From an article in the Wausau Daily Herald:

ROTHSCHILD — The massive coal-fired power plant Weston 4 must limit the visibility of pollutants leaving its main smokestack but does not need tighter controls for other emissions, an appeals court ruled today.

A three-judge panel of the District 4 Court of Appeals agreed with the Sierra Club that the state Department of Natural Resources erred when it did not require the smokestack for the plant’s main boiler to follow a federal visibility standard for pollutants on its air pollution permit.

Limiting the visibility of emissions effectively limits the amount of harmful particulate matter that becomes airborne. The DNR and the plant’s operator, Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of Green Bay, argued the visibility standard was unnecessary because emissions of particulate matter and sulfuric acid from the boiler were controlled in other ways.

The appeals court sided with the environmental group, which argued that the visibility standard was clearly required under the Clean Air Act. The rule will require continuous monitoring to ensure the pollution leaving the smokestack meets an opacity standard — that it is much closer to invisible than a thick black cloud of dust.

The court rejected the Sierra Club’s argument that the plant needs to install different technology to further reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide. The court found the limits set by the DNR were appropriate.

The $774 million plant near Wausau opened in 2008. It is owned by WPS and Dairyland Power Cooperative of La Crosse, and they say it is one of the cleanest coal plants in the nation.

The Sierra Club says it is nonetheless one of the largest pollution sources in central Wisconsin and has fought for years to strengthen the air permit.

Kids' health focus of biomass critics

From an article by Amy Ryan in the Wausau Daily Herald:

WESTON -- After presentations for and against a proposed biomass energy plant to be built across from Rothschild Elementary School, the D.C. Everest Area School Board decided Tuesday to not yet take a position on the project.

Residents fighting the biomass plant were hopeful the board would join the effort to stop its construction.

"I think we have too much material. I would not make a recommendation at this time," said board member Rita Kasten.

We Energies plans to build a $250 million power plant that burns low-quality and unusable wood and paper waste, powering the Domtar paper mill in Rothschild and providing electricity to homes in portions of Wisconsin. We Energies hopes it will be operating by fall 2013.

Residents at the meeting said they were concerned about the effect the plant might have on the health of the children at the nearby elementary school. Those concerns were shared by board members and district administrators.

"USA TODAY ... studied 127,000 schools, and only 23,000 have worse air than Rothschild," said board member Larry Schaefer. "We're starting with some pretty poor air already. That's a concern I have with this plant."

Rob Hughes, the parent of a 7-month-old, lives near the proposed site of the energy plant and said he is concerned about children playing on the playground near an energy plant.

"In the long term, these particulates cause development of lung disease in children," he said. "It's hard to learn if you're puffing on an inhaler, if you're light-headed and struggling to breathe."

Representatives from We Energies and Domtar said the new plant would emit less pollution than the current biomass generators used at Domtar.

"There are very rigorous standards placed by regulatory agencies to protect our welfare," said Terry Charles, environmental health and safety manager for Domtar. "That includes asthmatics and elderly."

The plant would cut dependence on fossil fuels, reduce acid rain and be nearly carbon-neutral, the environmental advocacy group Clean Wisconsin and the U.S. Forest Service have said.

Costs of coal plants keep going up

A commentary by Michael Vickerman, executive director of RENEW Wisconsin:

For Immediate Release
April 7, 2010

For More Information Contact
Michael Vickerman
608.255.4044
mvickerman@renewwisconsin.org

Costs of coal plants keep going up
In recent weeks, some groups have suggested that we maintain our current energy portfolio, continuing to rely heavily on coal-fired generation for a substantial amount of our electricity. These groups claim that gradually moving toward more reliance on local, in-state sources of energy will increase electricity costs. These claims have been thoroughly discredited by two economic studies concluding that electricity bills will decrease with the Clean Energy Jobs Act.

Further, these groups refuse to acknowledge the substantial, ongoing costs associated with coal plants. Since 1999, Wisconsin utilities have spent over $2 billion of customer money keeping old, inefficient coal plants running. For comparison purposes, this sum is nearly triple the utilities’ investment in windpower facilities during the same period. Customers have seen the real and substantial impact of these coal plant costs through rising electricity rates over the past several years. These costs are in addition to the more than $700 million (exclusive of transportation costs) we send out of state each year to pay for the coal to fuel these aging plants. Reliance on dirty, antiquated coal plants leaves Wisconsin in a vulnerable position, unable to predict or control energy costs.

Unlike coal, clean resources like biogas, wind and solar will produce energy throughout their productive lives without requiring costly pollution abatement measures. Going forward, the more renewable energy we add to Wisconsin’s energy resource mix, the less exposed we will be to these downstream liabilities. The avoidance of these regulatory risks is another compelling reason for passing the Clean Energy Jobs Act legislation in this session.

Coal Plant Retrofit Costs (1999-2009)
(in Millions of Dollars)

Group says DNR dragging heels on UW-Point coal plant and others

From an article by Dee Hall in the La Crosse Tribune:

MADISON — The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is dragging its heels in addressing charges that four University of Wisconsin System coal-fired plants are violating the federal Clean Air Act, an environmental group says.

The Sierra Club alleged in comments last summer that the heating plants at the La Crosse, Eau Claire, Stevens Point and Stout campuses have undergone millions of dollars worth of upgrades that should trigger additional pollution controls.

A consultant’s report commissioned by the state Department of Admini-stration disagreed, concluding that the $16.8 million in changes at the four facilities don’t qualify as “major modifications.“

Officials at the DNR, which issues operating permits for the four plants, say they’re still evaluating the comments.

Jeff Johnson, environmental engineering supervisor for the air-management program at the DNR’s regional office in Eau Claire, said the permit reviews are “complicated” and it will take time to evaluate the written comments filed by the Sierra Club and others expected from the U.S. Environ-mental Protection Agency.

“I do not have all the information on how the comments from Sierra Club and EPA will be handled, but do know we have a small task force working on resolving these issues,” Johnson said.

Charges that state-owned power plants are violating the federal clean-air law come at an awkward time for Gov. Jim Doyle, who late last year unveiled his Clean Energy Jobs Act. It calls for 25 percent of the state’s energy to come from wind, solar, biomass or other renewable sources by 2025. At the end of 2008, the state was at nearly 5 percent.

Wisconsin currently relies heavily on coal, which is a major source of greenhouse gases that contribute to global climate change.

'We can only move so fast'
While the overwhelming majority of that coal is burned by private utilities, the state owns 15 coal-fired plants that serve UW campuses, state treatment facilities and prisons and state-owned buildings in Madison including the Capitol. The plants provide steam to heat the buildings, and some generate electricity and chilled water for cooling.

“Clearly one of the first and best steps he (Doyle) could take is to clean up the state of Wisconsin facilities,” said Jennifer Feyerherm, director of the Sierra Club’s Wisconsin Clean Energy Campaign. “It seems like the first logical step for someone who wants to take the lead on global warming.”

Wisconsin clean energy bill moves ahead

From an article by Lisa Kaiser in the Shepard Express (Milwaukee):

Supporters of a proposed clean energy bill promise that not only will the new green energy standards help the environment, but that they will also help the state’s bottom line.

If passed by the state Legislature, the proposed Clean Energy Jobs Act would increase the amount of electricity to be generated by renewable energy, change building codes, implement new energy standards for appliances and cars sold in the state, revise the state’s requirements for new nuclear power plants, and require the state Department of Transportation (DOT) to consider greenhouse gas emissions when planning a new transportation project.

The bill, built on recommendations from the Governor’s Task Force on Global Warming, would require 25% of the state’s energy to be produced from renewable sources by 2025 and encourage businesses and residents to conserve energy and increase energy efficiency measures.

Taken together, the bill’s provisions would cut the state’s greenhouse gas emissions 22% by 2022 and 75% by 2050.

The bill will be introduced in the state Legislature after the winter break, and supporters would like to deliver it to the governor’s desk by April 22, 2010, the 40th anniversary of Earth Day.

Doyle backs off vow to take UWSP 'off the grid'

From an Associated Press article by Ryan J. Foley in the Green Bay Press Gazette:

MADISON — Gov. Jim Doyle has backed off a campaign promise that the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay and three other UW campuses will be energy independent by 2012 after determining it was not practical as proposed.

Weeks before he was re-elected in 2006, Doyle said campuses would “go off the grid” by becoming the first state agencies to purchase or produce as much energy from renewable sources as they consume. He said they would achieve that by replacing fossil fuels with cleaner energy sources like solar, wind and biomass.

The goal has since been changed to require the campuses to sharply reduce their carbon dioxide emissions, instead of ending them altogether or going off the grid entirely, by 2012. The change came into public view this month during a Board of Regents meeting.

Some university officials say the original plan never made much sense because “going off the grid” would have required them to start producing their own electricity instead of buying it from utilities, which was not feasible or cost-effective.

At the same time, they credit the challenge with spurring them to conserve energy, study alternative fuels, and purchase more renewable sources from the utilities that provide their electricity.

Doyle told reporters Wednesday his original vision may have been unrealistic because of the challenges associated with producing energy on campuses, but the program would still motivate students and university employees to reduce pollution.

Biomass power plants much cleaner than coal

From an article by Nick Halter in the Wausau Daily Herald:

A new biomass power plant in Rothschild would cut dependence on fossil fuels, reduce acid rain and be nearly carbon-neutral, according to studies and experts.

It's also a step, albeit a small one, toward Wisconsin reaching its goal of having 10 percent of all energy produced using renewable resources by 2015 -- a goal established in Gov. Jim Doyle's Clean Energy Wisconsin Plan.

We Energies announced plans Sept. 1 to build a $250 million power plant that burns low-quality and unusable wood and paper waste, powering the Domtar paper mill and providing electricity to homes in Wisconsin. The plant still needs state approval before construction can begin.

Burning wood is much cleaner than burning coal, the source of 70 percent of the electricity on Wisconsin's power grid, said Keith Reopelle, senior policy director for the environmental advocacy group Clean Wisconsin.

"I think that biomass will and needs to play an important role in replacing coal generation in Wisconsin and I think there will be a trend towards it, Reopelle said.
According to the U.S. Forest Service, burning wood is nearly carbon-neutral because the carbon dioxide generated during combustion is equal to the carbon dioxide the tree consumes over its life. But the process will remain carbon-neutral only if forestry companies that supply wood to the power plant replace the trees that they cut.

State investigates shutdowns at new coal plant

From an article by Tom Content in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

State utility regulators are reviewing the extent of a steam-generator tube problem with the coal-fired power plant that opened last year near Wausau.

The power plant experienced unexpected shutdowns late last year and early this year, with more expected this year to address the problem, according to the state Public Service Commission.

Wisconsin Public Service Corp. opened the $773 million power plant, the first coal plant built in the state in a generation, in June 2008.

At issue is whether WPS is eligible to pass along the cost of power it had to purchase late last year when the coal plant wasn't running.

Tim LeMonds, a spokesman for the Public Service Commission, said the steam generating tubes at the power plant have a tendency to clog, and the plant needs to take measures to keep the pipes clean to avoid future clogging.

Dennis Derricks, WPS director of electric regulatory policy, said the problem is a routine start-up issue that the company is addressing with the company that built the power plant, Babcock & Wilcox. According to Derricks, the power plant is still projected to operate 92% of the time, as the utility had projected when it proposed the plant.

The plant, one of two major coal plants built in the state, was recognized with industry awards including Plant of the Year by Power Magazine, an industry trade publication, and 2008 Best Coal-Fired Project by Power Engineering magazine.

Derricks said clogging isn't the best way to describe the problem. The tubes have an exfoliation problem that is common across the industry and is expected to improve this year.

"The outages going forward are to manage the amount of material that flakes off," he said. "The tubes are expected to season themselves and develop a coating over them" that helps address the problem, according to Derricks.