Drought, Gas-Fired Power Plant Nearly Snuff Out Providence Waterfire

With southern New England in a mild drought and Providence River water needed to cool Dominion's natural gas-fired Manchester Street Power Station, last week Providence's famed WaterFire had to ditch the gondolas:

Organizers of the popular public art display, featuring small bonfires on rivers in downtown Providence, say Friday night's partial WaterFire lighting in the Waterplace Park Basin will be done by volunteers in waders. Typically, boaters keep the flames lit, and Friday's plans called for the city's hurricane barrier to be closed to ensure sufficiently high water levels.

But with high temperatures forecast this weekend, a power plant on the river bank may need to run at full capacity. So the hurricane barrier must be opened to ensure a constant flow of coolant water.

New England remains overly dependent on nuclear and natural gas-fired power, with a lingering but shrinking slice of coal-fired power, all of which are extremely water-intensive. As global warming continues fueling more droughts, water-intensive energy sources are at risk of becoming increasingly unreliable.

Which makes some other news this week especially important: New Interior Secretary Sally Jewell is moving forward with offshore wind leases off Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Offshore wind and solar power will not only strengthen our energy security - hopefully they mean we won't have to get used to the hip waders at WaterFire.

Dominion Sale Shows Old Coal Power Plants Are Nearly Worthless

Big news today as Dominion announced it's selling two old coal-fired power plants and one gas power plant - and the price-tag is eye-popping:

The power stations are:

• Brayton Point Power Station, a 1,528-megawatt power station in Somerset, Mass., with three coal-fired units and one unit fired by oil or natural gas. Dominion has owned it since 2005.
• Kincaid Power Station, a 1,158-megawatt power station in Kincaid, Ill., with two 579-megawatt coal-fired units. Dominion has owned Kincaid since 1998.
• Elwood Power Station, a 1,424-megawatt power station outside Chicago, with nine natural gas-fired combustion turbines. Dominion has owned a 50 percent interest (712 megawatts) in and operated the station since Elwood became operational in 1999.

The sale will require the approval of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and Hart-Scott-Rodino antitrust clearance.

Dominion announced last September that it was exiting the merchant coal-fired generation business as part of the company's continual review of its assets to ensure they fit strategically and support its objectives to improve return on invested capital and shareholder value. The sale is expected to result in after-tax proceeds of approximately $650 million, which includes cash tax benefits generated from the sale. The company plans to invest the proceeds in the company's regulated businesses and reduce debt needs.

"Merchant power" is basically when you own a station and sell the electricity to a utility. It's always a risky business and at a time when America's electricity use is falling overall and the price of electricity from natural gas is falling, now's looking like a good time to bail for whatever Dominion can get.

But look at that low sale value - and that includes tax write-offs! Considering Dominion had spent $1 billion on upgrades at Brayton Point alone in recent years, including two enormous cooling towers, Dominion must be taking an absolute bath. But especially as new Clean Air Act limits on industrial carbon pollution loom, Dominion's happy to take what it can get for the coal plants.

Speaking of limits on industrial carbon pollution, now would be a good time to tell President Obama you support the strongest limits possible.

Fishermen, Faith Leaders Ask MA Governor to Push to Close Coal-Fired Power Plant

Dominion's Brayton Point coal-fired power plant in Somerset, MA is back in the news, this time with protesters calling for its closure:

The group of more than 20 people gathered in Fall River's Kennedy Park, within full view of the plant's three smoke stacks, and carried homemade signs advocating for the closure of the Somerset plant.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, in 2010 a total of 147 pounds of mercury and mercury compounds were released in Massachusetts, 64 by Brayton Point. Also according to the EPA, in 2008 the power plant emitted more than 37,000 tons of toxic chemicals into the air.

"This pollution doesn't only affect Somerset; the majority spreads and settles in cities and towns across a 30-mile radius from the power plant," Sylvia Broude, executive director of the Toxics Action Center, said. "We are calling on Gov. Patrick to use his power to transition Massachusetts away from coal."

Among those asking Gov. Patrick to create a transition plan were fishermen & faith leaders. Here's a video I did last year explaining the issue:

How Many Jobs Did GOP Clean Energy Obstruction Just Cost Virginia?

Congressional Republicans, led by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), have been blocking extension of several key clean energy tax credits, investments that represent a tiny fraction of the subsidies received by the oil, gas & nuclear industries over time. And here in Virginia, officials have dragged their feet on encouraging offshore wind and been accused of letting Dominion Virginia Power slow down the process.

Now the GOP's ideological war is having real consequences and costing Virginia jobs at a critical time for the fragile economic recovery. Wind energy giant Gamesa has announced that if the U.S. and Virginia can't commit to wind energy, it can't commit to the U.S., building key new wind prototypes off Spain & Africa instead:

While still committed to developing a U.S. market, a Gamesa spokeswoman said the slow pace of regulatory actions, uncertainty over the future of tax credits for offshore development and the lack of a federal energy policy all conspired against investment in the prototype.

"Without a mature offshore wind market in the United States, it is extremely difficult to justify the enormous expenditure of capital and utilization of engineering and technical resources that would be needed to build and install a prototype in the U.S.," Gamesa spokesman Susana Sanjuan wrote in an email to The Associated Press. The prototype was to rise in the lower Chesapeake Bay, about three miles off the town of Cape Charles. It had a late 2013 completion date, which would have made it the first wind turbine in offshore U.S. waters.

The prototype was the first publicly announced product to emerge from a partnership between Gamesa and Huntington Ingalls Newport News Shipbuilding. Gamesa also announced that partnership will "wind down" by year's end with the design of a new offshore platform completed.

Just a couple of months ago, Gov. Bob McDonnell had raved about the project. "This wind turbine prototype will bring jobs, jobs and more jobs, and it positions Virginia to be a leader in clean energy technology," said Virginia Secretary of Natural Resources Doug Domenech.

Will Cantor and McDonnell now idly sit by while Virginia gets left in the dust by leaders that are serious about creating jobs and protecting public health with offshore wind?

Climate Activists Blow the Whistle on "Dominion's Foul Trouble"

350.org's Bill McKibben and the Chesapeake Climate Action Network's Mike Tidwell says when it comes to investing in clean & secure energy sources, Virginia fouls out:

The problem is the state's largest utility, Dominion Virginia Power. While states like Minnesota and Iowa get 10 to 20 percent of their electricity from wind power alone, creating thousands of jobs, Dominion generates zero electricity for Virginia ratepayers from wind or solar.

Instead, the utility invests overwhelmingly in dirty fossil fuels. Despite rising global warming concerns and smog-filled summer skies in Shenandoah National Park, Dominion plans to increase the renewable-energy slice of its cumulative energy pie by a microscopic 0.4 percent over the next 15 years. You read that right: 0.4 percent.

There's no sign things will change without some loud and much-deserved booing from the crowd. Which is why ratepayers from across the state have set Saturday as "The March to End Dominion's Power Madness."

The rally will be Saturday (March 24) at noon outside Dominion's Richmond headquarters, sign up at EndPowerMadness.com.

Dominion Says It's Moving Forward With Wind Farm Off Virginia

On the same day the Obama administration announced streamlined permitting process for offshore wind energy, possible turbines off the Virginia coast took a big step forward:

Dominion Virginia Power is interested in building up to 400 wind turbines in Atlantic waters in what could be a powerful message for a slowly emerging domestic source of clean energy.

"If everything aligns and it makes good sense and we have our regulators on board, yes, we would be moving forward on a wind farm," Mary Doswell, Dominion's senior vice president for alternative energy solutions, said Thursday in an interview with The Associated Press.

The article doesn't say how much electricity will be produced, but Cape Wind only has 130 wind turbines and will produce up to 420 megawatts, so we could be looking at several coal-fired power plants worth of electricity. That power will come with none of the millions of tons of deadly air pollution the equivalent coal plants would produce each year. Additionally, Cape Wind is expected to create up to 1,000 construction jobs and support 150 permanent jobs. While Doswell said offshore wind energy costs 28 cents per kilowatt hour, Cape Wind is set to be sold for less than 19 cents per kilowatt hour and I'm not sure why there's such a wide disparity in Dominion's estimate.

Down the road, conservationists will need to get behind the plan to tell regulators they're happy to pay a little more on their power bills to keep our air & water clean and preserve Virginia's mountains for future generations to enjoy. For now, email Gov. Bob McDonnell to let him know you want wind turbines - not oil drilling rigs - off Virginia's beaches.

Dominion Virginia Power Proves the Sierra Club Right

Dominion Virginia Power CEO Paul Koonce has an op-ed in today's Washington Post responding to a recent evisceration of Dominion by Virginia Sierra Club Vice Chair Ivy Main. She'd made three key charges:

1. Dominion is using pre-existing hydro power or biomass projects of dubious environmental value for renewable energy credits
2. Dominion is not building large-scale solar and wind projects in Virginia to deliver that energy to Virginia customers
3. Dominion is insanely planning to slap a massive fee on customers who install their own solar power

Koonce's response?

Our renewable generation includes one of the largest biomass plants in the East, taking advantage of one of Virginia’s richest renewable resources. Four more biomass projects are in various stages of construction or development. We operate several hydroelectric facilities and have announced plans for solar arrays on commercial and public buildings. Other Dominion companies operate large wind farms in Indiana and West Virginia.

That's Koonce's big rebuttal? That Dominion DOES rely heavily on existing hydro & questionable biomass, ISN'T currently building solar or wind in Virginia ... oh, and the massive fees on renewable energy? The CEO of Dominion, which earned $1 billion in profit in the first 9 months of 2011 alone, calls them "simple matter of fairness."

He might as well have written, "The 1% don't have to explain themselves to people like you."

Dominion's Energy Tyranny: Where's the Outrage from the Tea Party & Ken Cuccinelli?

Virginia's 2007 energy re-regulation bill was a terrible idea from the start. It was essentially written by Dominion Virginia Power and rubber-stamped into law by the Virginia General Assembly & Gov. Tim Kaine, who showed no interest in challenging one of Virginia's top sources of money in politics.

Five years later, as Virginia Sierra Club Vice Chair Ivy Main writes in the Washington Post, Virginia taxpayers are seeing huge costs and little benefit:

Yes, the Dominion family owns some wind farms, one just across the state line in West Virginia. But we aren’t getting a single electron of that energy, because Dominion sells it to other states that have much tougher standards for what counts as renewable energy. For us in Virginia, Dominion buys cheap certificates that no one else wants.

That’s a great deal for Dominion. According to the Southern Environmental Law Center, $1.7 million could buy enough of these certificates to satisfy Dominion’s 2010 RPS targets, qualifying the company to collect an extra $76 million over two years from its ratepayers.

Worse yet, Dominion is aggressively using its monopoly power to target any small businesses who try to sell clean energy to customers in Virginia:

The State Corporation Commission recently granted Dominion’s request to impose a “standby” charge of up to $60 per month on customers who install solar projects in the 10- to 20-kilowatt range (about twice the size of an average home’s usage). It’s enough to make these projects uneconomic and destroy the market for them. At a time when Dominion claims we need to build more power to meet demand, it is doing its best to keep small businesses from doing precisely that.

Even worse is its treatment of a Staunton-based solar company called Secure Futures, which has stepped up to the plate to put solar installations on university campuses, using a third-party power purchase agreement to ease financing. This summer, Dominion hit Secure Futures with “cease and desist” letters, claiming it can’t legally sell solar power to Washington and Lee University within Dominion’s exclusive service territory under Virginia law. Dominion, you understand, will not sell solar power to Washington and Lee, but it seems determined to make sure no one else does, either.

Where are Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli & his Tea Party friends as Dominion treads on the rights of small businesses and Virginia energy customers? Shouldn't they be screaming about activist judges and goverment stifling liberty? Or does Tea Party outrage not cover regulations that enrich its polluting benefactors?

Want to tell Dominion to create jobs and clean our air by investing in wind power? Sign the Virginia Sierra Club's petition to Dominion CEO Tom Farrell.

Revisiting Arizona's Solar vs. Virginia's Coal

A few years back, I did a post about two states making divergent energy choices - Arizona picking renewable power, Virginia picking coal.

So how's solar power working for Arizona?

About 850 construction workers have descended on Gila Bend to work on the plants this summer, and about double that number are expected next year as the largest alternative-energy project in the state, the Solana Generating Station [at right], ramps up construction. [...]

Abel Ortiz, 49, of Buckeye, had been out of work for months before landing a job as a laborer at the power plant.

He said the pay assembling the solar-panel arrays was good. Normally, a labor job would pay about $8 an hour, but he's making more than $10 an hour, he said. [...]

The two small plants have a combined 34 megawatts of capacity, and Solana has 280, putting the economic benefit to Gila Bend north of $300 million from the current projects.

"These projects have been taking a lot of folks that have been unemployed and putting them to work," Geisler said.

Meanwhile, electricity prices in Virginia are up about 35 percent since 2005. Electric rates in Arizona have increased somewhat, but there's one major difference: While Arizona has incentivized efficiency, the Virginia General Assembly still tells Dominion Virginia Power to make more profit by selling you more juice.

So while Arizona Public Service Co. will be trying to cut its customers' electricity use 22 percent by 2020, Dominion Virginia Power expects demand to increase 30 percent by 2026. That means lower electricity bills in Arizona and higher electricity bills in Virginia.

Dominion Virginia Power Switching Three Coal Plants to Biomass

Dominion is upgrading three power plants from coal to biomass & it's also moving forward with a study on the transmission of power generated by offshore wind. Read all the details from Lowell over at Blue Virginia.

Possibility of Wind Farm to Ruin Christmas

The concerns of nearby residents are one of many things that need to be considered when deciding where to put a wind farm. But fears in Virginia's Tazewell County seem to be getting a little ... well, exaggerated. Here's a recent column from the local paper:

While Christmas stories fill the season with hope and love, there is always a story about the Grinch who stole Christmas. With Dominion Resources recent announcement that it is acquiring 100 percent ownership of a 2,600-acre tract of land on East River Mountain for the purpose of developing the proposed Bluestone River Wind Farm, the Grinch is back — at least in the opinion of area people who oppose the windmills for many reasons. 

Yeah, you remember the Grinch? And that Dr. Seuss story about how he tried to build a $200 million project in Whoville that would deliver $10 million in local tax revenue & $10 million in related development? THE NERVE.

"Many reasons" looks more like reason being completely replaced by the fear of something new. Residents say they worry about property value, but even the National Association of Realtors says wind farm impact on property values is minimal (if existent at all). Residents express concern about unsightliness, but take a look at how the windmills would look in these Dominion projections:

I mean, really? Seeing these pictures, I could only be reminded of the melodramatic OH MY GOD of South Park's Randy Marsh. That's what you're protesting? The dots on the ridgeline?

It always strikes me as weird that people in places like Tazewell County suddenly act all protective of their land when all I had to do was a Google Map search of "Tazewell County, VA" to quickly find sites like this:

Massive open-pit mines? No problem! Windmills off in the distance? Christmas ruined. How does that work?

And in the big picture, for every windmill we don't build, we need to rely on that much more coal power, which annually kills thousands of people via air pollution & dozens more in mine disasters.

But it's hard to feel much sympathy for electric utilities in this case. They've stood by & watched for years as Republicans & Rush Limbaugh have trashed renewable energy as a socialist plot to leave your children shivering in the dark, because in the short term they were doing just fine making money off of coal power. I wonder if they regret it now.

How Few Jobs Will Wise Co. Coal Plant Create?

Dominion Virginia Power is spending $1.8 billion dollars worth of your electric bills to build a dirty coal-fired power plant in Wise County. How many jobs will that investment of our money deliver? Shockingly few, according to the Virginia Mining Association (PDF):

At the end of July, there were about 1,800 men and women employed in the construction of the 585-megawatt power station. The work force included about 600 people from the local area, accounting for 33.4 percent of total employment. The local area is defined as being within a 50-mile radius of the town of St. Paul, with Wise, Russell and Scott counties accounted for the majority of the local hires. Additionally, the staff that will operate the power station is being formed and trained. After Oct. 4 operations employment will stand at 34 with half of those hires coming from the local area.

Well hey, that's only $106 million of our money per permanent job for local residents. What a bargain!

Meanwhile, a Virginia State Corporation Commission analyst has testified (PDF) that, because the higher rates needed to pay for it, the plant will cost Virginia 1,474 jobs.

Now, apologists for this terrible deal will say, "But The Green Miles! They need every job they can get in Wise County!" By that rationale, why bother actually building the plant? As the Chesapeake Climate Action Network has pointed out, we could pay 75 Wise County residents $100,000 per year and give the county $6 million a year for the next 133 years with the $1.8 billion it will take to build the plant. And in that scenario, we wouldn't have to deal with the 5.4 million tons of carbon dioxide, thousands of tons of other air pollutants & dozens of pounds of mercury the plant will release.

All in all, a terrible deal for Virginia's economy & environment. 

Photo via Flickr's dmott9

No One Plugs a Lamp Into a Windmill.

Virginia tourism is very unreliable. Summer & weekends? Extremely busy! Winter & weekdays? Extremely slow!

A ridiculous premise? Of course! But that's the argument you often hear people make against wind power. When it's not windy, it doesn't produce as much power! You are correct, Mr. Wizard. I can't wait to hear your analysis of how much power solar produces on cloudy winter days. (Spoiler alert: Not as much!)

Here's the thing -- just as no one plugs their television directly into a nuclear reactor, no one plugs their television directly into a windmill. It's just one element of a massive electric grid.

But that doesn't stop people from acting like they've cracked some major conspiracy every time they point that out. Just look at a recent public hearing on the proposal by Dominion Power & BP Wind Energy to install wind turbines on top of East River Mountain in Tazewell County:

“It produces very little energy and it’s very unreliable,” said Charlie Stacy.

A power plant produces very little power? Really? I made many arguments against Dominion's Wise County coal fired power plants in the last few years, but "it produces very little energy" is one that never crossed my mind. Probably because it's beyond batty. Why bother building a reservoir? It produces very little water!

As for reliability, just as with tourism, you have to look at the big picture. A wind farm is part of a grid, which includes a mix of energy from an array of sources like coal, nuclear, natural gas, hydroelectric, solar & other sources.

Good day for wind? A nuclear plant can throttle back for the day. Bad day for wind? If demand's low on a given day, the grid may not miss it. If demand is high, a natural gas plant could work closer to capacity to make up the difference. (There's a misconception that all existing coal/gas/nuke plants work at 100% day & night. Not true except on a few of the hottest summer days.)

Or better yet, a smart grid could manage it. On good days, it could direct the excess electricity to other parts of the country where it was in demand. On bad days, it could pull more power from a part of the country where the wind was blowing strong. The bottom line is, customers wouldn't notice a thing.

If you've found all this energy nitty gritty fascinating, buy Al Gore's new book, Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis.

Photo courtesy Flickr's floyduk

We Can't Afford Clean Energy, We Spent All Our Money on Coal!

Life in coal country is hard. Jobs aren't easy to come by. People have been told for generations now that the only way they'll get by, the only way their very way of life can survive, is to hitch their wagons to Big Coal.

But coal's always been a losing bet. Maps of mountaintop removal overlap almost perfectly with poverty rates. In the face of that hard evidence, people in coal country who can start to sound like they're stuck in a dead-end relationship. No one else can ever love us but Big Coal! I know it's wrong, but it's all we have! And politicians of both parties have been convinced to look the other way by the coal money lining their pockets.

People trapped in dead-end relationships tend to rationalize it with statements that don't make any sense. Like this editorial from the Bluefield Daily Telegraph:

According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the federal cap-and-trade legislation will eventually cost the average household an extra $175 per year. Sadly, folks in our region — who have been bombarded with one rate increase after another in recent years — simply can’t afford to pay another nickel, dime or penny for electricity.

How can we possibly afford to leave coal -- we're getting soaked by coal! It's like a friend saying, "I can't possibly afford a new car -- it takes every dollar I have to keep my clunker on the road!"

It's not clean energy that's a risky financial bet -- it's staying hooked on increasingly expensive coal-fired power. And here in Virginia, we know what a lousy partner coal can be. We felt the pinch of coal's rising rates three times in the last year:

• An 18% rate hike last year, primarily to cover higher coal costs
• An average fee of $1.84 per customer in January to pay for the new coal-fired power plant in Wise County
• A 6.1% hike in September to pay for the Wise County plant and new transmission lines to carry coal-fired power from the Midwest to East Coast cities

Look, Coal Country. We're not saying you didn't love Big Coal with all your heart. But maybe they're just not the ones for you.

In fact, maybe you can find someone better. A shift to clean energy would create millions more jobs than staying addicted to coal.

And admit it -- wouldn't it feel good to finally kick that no-good, dirty Big Coal to the curb?

Cross-posted from Blue Virginia

MG09 Video: No Dominion Money Pledge

You can learn more about my No Dominion Money pledge at MilesGrant2009.com:

No Dominion Money.

If you're a regular reader of The Green Miles, you know my feelings on Dominion Virginia Power. Since 1996, Dominion has contributed more than $5 million to Virginia political candidates and committees.

Our reliance on increasingly expensive, dirty coal power is a failure to our community and a violation of Arlington values – economically, environmentally, and from a public health perspective. As an activist who’s spent years lobbying and organizing for clean energy and climate action here in Virginia, I’ve seen firsthand how Dominion’s huge financial power works to keep our energy policies locked into the status quo at a time when we desperately need a new direction.

That's why I've signed a pledge (PDF) not to accept contributions or gifts from Dominion or its employees:

April 29, 2009

As Virginia confronts the threat of climate change and our dependence on dirty, polluting energy sources, we need leaders who will think big and fight the special interests that block progress towards a clean energy future.

Dominion Virginian Power was the top business donor to Virginia politicians in 2008, contributing nearly twice as much as the runner-up, the tobacco company Altria. Their influence has gone unchallenged for years, allowing them to serve as the dominant force in policy decisions – consistently weighting the scales against clean energy and a cleaner Virginia. The stakes are too high to let that continue.

Therefore I, Miles Grant, Democratic candidate for House of Delegates in Virginia’s 47th district, pledge that I will not accept contributions or gifts from Dominion Resources, its subsidiaries or its employees, either as a candidate or as an elected official. If I ever mistakenly accept such a contribution, I pledge to give it to a clean energy or environmental nonprofit as soon as the error is discovered. I take this pledge not as a statement about Dominion's right to exist or its employees, but as a promise to consider only the public interest as we move Virginia's energy policies forward.

Miles Grant
Democrat for Delegate
Virginia’s 47th District in Arlington
MilesGrant2009.com

I know we can’t move Virginia’s energy policies into the 21st century without working to engage Dominion as a partner. I’m always happy to sit down and talk to Dominion. But I’m not interested in its financial backing.

Learn more about my campaign at MilesGrant2009.com.

What Recession? Dominion Wants Raises, Guaranteed Profits

"The sustainability of our economic development successes are dependent on having a reliable energy source," -- Delacey Skinner, Gov. Tim Kaine's communications director, talking about coal-fired power, March 31, 2008

I think of that quote every time I hear about how our continued dependence on coal-fired power is hurting consumers and businesses and leaving Virginians in the dark.

The only thing dependable these days about coal-fired power is that it keeps getting more expensive. And the only thing reliable is Dominion's guaranteed profits:

RICHMOND, March 31 -- Dominion Virginia Power is seeking to raise electricity rates 6.9 percent during the next 14 months to pay for equipment, salaries, plant construction and conservation projects. [...]

Dominion said incremental increases proposed for Sept. 1 and Jan. 1 will pay for operating costs, power plants in Buckingham and Wise counties and conservation programs. The increase also includes a 13.5 percent profit for the company and its investors.

At a time when Virginia businesses are laying off workers, Dominion is asking them to divert more money away from their payrolls and towards Dominion's payroll and profit.

The proposed 7 percent hike would be on top of the 18 percent rate increase we just got hit with in September. Oddly, the Washington Post article doesn't mention the 1.5 percent fee Dominion quietly added in January to cover the cost of the new $2 billion coal-fired power plant in Wise County. Compounding the rate hikes, it would be more than a 28 percent total increase.

But surely our elected officials will take a stand for consumers ... right?

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D), who does not have a formal role in reviewing the request, said Dominion officials informed him they would be seeking an increase.

"The SCC is a strong body with a great staff, and I think they will do due diligence on this," he said. "It's difficult because the cost of energy is going up."

Wow. Dominion wants to raise customers' energy bills more than 28 percent in the worst economy since the Great Depression, and all Gov. Kaine can muster is a shrugging "well, what're ya gonna do"?

Our continuing dependence on dirty coal is taking money out of consumers' pockets, costing Virginia jobs, stripping our natural resources, polluting our air, and warming our planet. Remember that the next time anyone tries to tell you we can't switch to clean energy.

MilesGrant2009.com

Coal Prices Catch Fire, Virginians Left in Cold

In the wake of Dominion Virginia Power’s 18 percent rate increase due to higher fuel costs, the Washington Post reported on Friday that this winter “the utility shut-off service to 93,890 customers for nonpayment, a 15 percent jump from 2007.” Last month, the Virginian-Pilot reported Dominion has added a 1.4 percent fee to all electricity bills to finance construction of its new $2 billion coal-fired power plant in Wise County.

It's outrageous that Virginians are losing their heat because they’re being asked to pick up the tab for our Commonwealth’s refusal to break – or even ease – our addiction to coal. Now Virginia faces a triple threat – our energy crisis is deepening our economic crisis while our climate crisis continues to go unaddressed.

Fortunately, the same solutions can take steps towards solving all three crises at the same time. We can save consumers money by making their homes more energy efficient, strengthen our economy by creating thousands of green jobs, and preserve our environment for our children and grandchildren by cutting Virginia's global warming pollution.

Our leaders in Richmond need to give Dominion new incentives to begin the shift away from coal and towards renewable energy sources like solar and wind power. We’ll need bold action from Virginia's new governor and our next General Assembly to chart a new course towards clean energy. I’ll fight to make that happen.

Learn more about my campaign for House of Delegates at MilesGrant2009.com.

Virginia's "Confederate States of America"-Era Energy System

A must-read post over at Gristmill from Chesapeake Climate Action Network Executive Director Mike Tidwell:

[A]s the election approaches, here's the surprising question for every Northern Virginia voter: Why is this high-tech region, so dedicated to a "knowledge-based" economy, utterly dependent on an energy system as old as the Confederate States of America? Northern Virginia gets the lion's share of its electric power not from wind turbines or solar farms, but from coal. A shocking 1,180,400 tons of raw coal each year, nearly half of the area's total load. And it's not "clean coal" or "high-tech" coal. Just black, sooty, rip-it-from-the-ground-and-set-it-on-fire coal.

You'd think it would be different. You'd think Northern Virginia would be a leader in developing clean, sustainable energy at a level equal to its high-tech, high-education status.

You'd think. But two roadblocks stand in the way: Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine (D) and mega-utility Dominion Power.

Tidwell concludes with a call for investments in efficiency to cut power bills, saying Virginians "use more electricity every day than 75 percent of the rest of America. Surely we could do much, much better." But Virginia's current system allows Dominion to reap the most profits by selling us the most power.

Of course, while Kaine and Dominion are the biggest roadlocks, General Assembly Republicans have shown no interest in cutting consumers' power bills or easing our dependence on dirty, expensive energy sources. And many General Assembly Democrats are, at best, speed bumps, reluctant to challenge Richmond's status quo.

Cross-posted from RK

Video: Protesting Dominion in Wise County

Here's a video from the Rainforest Action Network on yesterday's protest against Dominion in Wise County, Virginia:



In addition, check out the schedule for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network's Wise Energy Tour in Northern Virginia.