Washington Examiner reports electric power sector coal consumption in the U.S. last year tumbled to a 35-year low, EIA announced Friday. The amount of coal used in the power sector in 2017 was 36 percent lower than in 2008, when U.S. coal production reached its highest level.
Porter: America needs coal and nuclear power for energy diversity
The Roanoke Times has a piece from former EPA Assistant Administrator J. Winston Porter in which he writes about the importance of government intervention on behalf of coal and nuclear plants.
After Pulling Out Of Paris Climate Accords, U.S. Led The World In Decreasing Carbon Emissions Last Year
Over at the Daily Wire, Emily Zanotti reports that according to the June 2018 BP Statistical Review of Global Energy, the United States led the world last year in reducing carbon emissions across the board, even though President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Accords in 2017.
Strangely enough, Canada, Spain, the European Union, and China — all signatories to the infamous Paris Climate Accords negotiated by the United Nations — saw significant increases in carbon dioxide emissions.
Despite the environmental left’s overwrought predictions of disaster, we seem to be doing just fine without the Paris Accords.
Coal Jobs Coming Back to Kentucky
WYMT reports 150 coal jobs are returning to Eastern Kentucky after Bluestone Industries announced the planned hiring for three mines in Pike and Letcher Counties. Letcher County has taken a significant hit when it comes to coal. A year ago, Kingdom Coal Mine restarted production, only to shut back down a year later.
100% Renewable Energy? Not Really
Western Energy News reports that the small utility that serves Aspen, Colorado is already running entirely on clean energy. This is very misleading, and as Paul Harvey used to say, “now, for the rest of the story.”
When someone says they have achieved 100% renewable energy, they mean capacity, not energy. For example, let’s say a city has 10 megawatts of demand, and they have a 10 megawatt wind farm to provide electricity. That wind farm has the capacity to produce 10 megawatts of energy when the wind is blowing at the appropriate speed. However, and this is important, the wind is not always blowing. When the wind is not blowing (or not blowing optimally), that wind farm is producing much less than the 10 megawatts necessary to provide adequate electricity to the city.
Electricity generating units, no matter the fuel source, do not always perform at their peak capacity. A unit’s capacity factor is the average power generated, divided by the rated peak power. Let’s take a wind turbine rated at five megawatts. If it produces power at an average of two megawatts, then its capacity factor is 40% (2÷5 = 0.40, i.e. 40%). In 2017, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported that the average capacity factor for wind generation is the U.S. was 36.7%. By comparison, the average capacity factor for coal was 53.5%.
But wait, Terry, you say. Can’t you just build enough extra capacity over what you need to get to the 100%? Well yes, you can, but that still does not change the fact that the wind does not always blow. Some days, very little wind energy is generated, especially when it is very hot (and power is most needed). Anyone who regularly drives by wind farms can tell you that many times, the wind turbines are not turning at all. You have to have another source of power on which to rely.
Where does the city get its needed electricity when the wind isn’t blowing (or isn’t blowing optimally)? Most likely from more traditional forms of power generation, like coal, nuclear, or natural gas. So, the city is not running 100% on clean energy. Not even close.
This is not a knock on wind energy. I have always been in favor of an all-of-the-above energy strategy. We need all forms of power generation for reliable and affordable electricity. Making decisions on the mix of fuel sources to provide reliable and affordable electricity is hard enough without misleading information. Wind can be a good source of generating electricity, but it can’t supply 100% of our energy needs.
“Green” Energy, An Environmental Disaster
The folks over at Powerline do a great job of shedding light on energy issues. John Hinderaker is reporting that one of the worst features of both wind and solar energy is that they are terrible for the environment. Land-based wind turbines are bad enough, but offshore installations are a fiasco waiting to happen.
Kilauea’s Wrath Threatens Power Plant — And Hawaii’s Most Powerful Industry
NPR is reporting that Lava flows are threatening a power plant in Hawaii.
U.S. power grid ready for summer, but California & Texas are concerns: FERC
Reuters reports FERC said in a report that energy shortages are possible this summer in Southern California, attributable to low hydropower and gas supplies, as well as in Texas after several coal-fired power plants retired. Nationwide, if this summer’s weather is warmer than normal as forecasted, more gas could be burned to produce electricity than in 2016, when a record was last set, due to low gas prices and added gas-fired generation.
If Solar And Wind Are So Cheap, Why Do They Make Electricity So Expensive?
Over at Powerline, John Hinderaker discusses why renewable energy (wind and solar) increases electricity rates. As usual, John hits it out of the park!
Missouri should consider high-tech coal plants
The Southeast Missourian carries my op-ed supporting investment in the development of small-scale, “modular” coal plants that some are calling the power plants of the future.
Who turned off the lights?
The Washington Times carries a column from Stephen Moore, a columnist and a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, in which he writes that something must be done to save coal and nuclear power because, “If the lights start to go out five or 10 years from now, we will look back at what is happening today and wonder how we could have been so darn stupid.”
The Wind Energy Fiasco, Writ Large
Over at Powerline, John Hinderaker writes about GE’s new wind turbine, which will be almost as large as the Eiffel Tower. Bigger doesn’t always mean better, and John does a great job of pointing out the problems of relying too much on wind energy.
Trump Administration aims to take coal high-tech
I have a new op-ed carried by the The Farmington Daily Times (NM) and the Ogden Sentinel News (UT) in which I highlight DOE’s RFI on small-scale modular coal plants as “a high-tech approach that could appeal to environmentalists looking to secure realistic reductions in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.”
Clean Power Plan simply isn’t lawful
The Hill carries an op-ed by Ashley Burke reinforcing the reasons for the repeal of the EPA’s Clean Power Plan.
Largest US energy grid operator to study too much reliance on natural gas
The Hill reports that Andy Ott, chief executive of PJM, said the electric grid operator will study the risks of relying too heavily on one energy source, as energy production comes increasingly from natural gas rather than from coal.
Voters tell Washington to upgrade America’s coal fleet
Today in the Washington Examiner, Luke Popovich writes that most Americans agree that it’s time to modernize America’s coal fleet—whether through the use of HELE technologies or other advanced coal technologies.
EPA opts for accountability and transparency in environmental science
Check out my new article in The Hill!
New Study: Global Warming Is ‘Not As Bad As We Thought’
Over at the Daily Wire, James Barrett reports that a new study by climatologist Judith Curry and mathematician Nick Lewis show that future warming is likely to be substantially lower than the central computer model-simulated level projected by the IPCC. Here is the link to the entire piece:
https://www.dailywire.com/news/29865/new-study-global-warming-not-bad-we-thought-james-barrett
NETL exploring new clean coal tech
The State Journal (WV) reports that the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory is pioneering new tools and methods to make the nation’s coal-fired power plants cleaner and more efficient. George “Geo” Richards, Energy Conversion Engineering Senior Fellow at NETL, said today’s coal-fired plants are operating in a very different way than they did 10 or 15 years ago.
Coal emerges as power champion of the winter
My new article is running today in the Huntington, WV, Herald-Dispatch. You can read the entire piece here:
It’s been a rough winter for much of America. As the Department of Energy has reported, a “bomb cyclone” winter storm struck much of the eastern United States in late December and early January. It plunged the region into a deep freeze and sparked a significant rise in demand for additional power. And if that wasn’t enough, winter has also lingered longer than expected, yielding surprise snowstorms in early spring.
Right now, power utilities are busily reviewing the past few months and asking “How did we do?” The surprising answer, according to the Department of Energy, is that they did all right specifically because coal-generated electricity bore the brunt of eastern United States energy demand during the chilliest parts of winter 2018.
According to a new report from the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory, in January 2018 “U.S. electricity market experience demonstrated that without the resilience of coal plants the eastern United States would have suffered severe electricity shortages, likely leading to widespread blackouts.”
How is this possible – that coal shouldered most of the burden of keeping America’s lights on? After all, we hear increasing talk about the benefits of wind and solar power, along with more abundant natural gas. The suggestion has been that coal is no longer necessary.
The DOE report found that far from being unnecessary, coal is essential. Coal power plants have the unique ability to store fuel on-site, and they provided 55 percent of incremental daily U.S. power generation this winter. For the largest grid operators, coal provided the “most resilient form of generation due to available reserve capacity and on-site fuel availability, far exceeding all other sources.” Specifically, the data showed that coal provided three times the incremental power generation of natural gas and 12 times that of nuclear units.
The report also noted some interesting limits to nuclear power, natural gas and wind turbines. For example, most nuclear plants were already running at maximum output, and could only provide “negligible additional capacity” during peak conditions. Conversely, a surge in heating demand and pipeline congestion meant that natural gas was limited in adding “resilient capacity” for power plants. Renewable fuels performed even worse. Available wind energy was 12 percent lower during the “bomb cyclone” than for a typical winter day, resulting in a need for “dispatchable” fossil fuel generation to make up the difference.
The bottom line, according to the DOE study, is that coal provided a majority of the daily power generation needed to meet emergency winter conditions. But coal has been on the chopping block for the better part of a decade – which begs the question: What happens if more coal plants are retired? One NETL analyst cautions that “removing coal from the energy mix would worsen threats to the electrical grid’s dependability during future severe weather events.”
America needs a smart energy policy. And that means pursuing an all-of-the-above strategy. For example, there are exciting technologies being developed for wind and solar power. But advanced coal technologies are also emerging, and they can reduce emissions while increasing power generating efficiency. All of this should be pursued since the NETL study worries about the nation’s ability to “respond to weather events if the current rate of coal plant retirements continues.” The answer is to encourage American ingenuity, and include high-tech coal plants in a diverse mix of future power generation sources.