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Sierra Club’s Anti-Coal Campaign Hits a Landmark

By Scott Gibson
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The Sierra Club has taken aim at all 523 coal-burning power plants in the U.S. with its Beyond Coal campaign. This plant is in central Wyoming.

Under pressure from the Sierra Club and federal and state government agencies, five power plants in Iowa will phase out the use of coal, putting the Sierra Club that much closer to forcing the closure of half the nation’s 523 coal-fired plants by 2017.

A federal district court settlement between the Department of Justice, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Sierra Club, and Iowa state agencies will force Interstate Power and Light to either switch from coal to natural gas or entirely shutter five plants in the state. Two other power plants will get new pollution controls, according to an article at Huffington Post.

With the five latest power plants in Iowa, the Sierra Club has now had a hand in closing a total of 200 coal-fired plants under its Beyond Coal campaign. When the effort was launched six years ago, the Sierra Club said it hoped to see half the country’s coal plants shut by 2020. Now that date has been moved forward.

Interstate Power and Light also has agreed to spend $6 million on environmental mitigation projects and pay $1.1 million for Clean Air Act violations, Huffington Post reported.

“Back in 2009, the prevailing wisdom was that coal was inevitable, that the U.S. would be burning coal for a long time,” Bruce Nilles, ‎senior campaign director for Beyond Coal, said. “We set out to show that you can make a lot of progress even without a climate bill.”

Alliant Energy, the Interstate subsidiary that operates the plants, said it, too, was pleased with the settlement.

Coal in sharp decline

Coal as been the largest fuel source for generating electricity in the U.S. for more than 60 years, but its share of total net generation dropped from about 50% in 2007 to 39% in 2013, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Almost all of the coal consumed in the U.S., 93%, is used for generating electricity. It added up to more than 858 million short tons in 2013.

Cheap natural gas is one reason coal use is on the decline. The Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, which seeks a 30% reduction in carbon emissions over 2005 levels by 2030, also is likely to mean more closures.

Mining interests don’t like it, but the Environmental Protection Agency says that in addition to cleaner air, the plan will lower power bills by roughly 8% by 2030.

Mary Anne Hitt, director of the Beyond Coal campaign, told the Huffington Post Iowa was an “appropriate place” to mark the closure of the 200th coal plant. With 5708mw of installed capacity, Iowa now generates more than 28% of its electricity from wind, according to the American Wind Energy Association, the highest percentage in the country.

“Iowa really is showing the rest of the country what their economy can look like,” Hitt said, “how to do well and prosper in a world powered by more and more clean energy.”

Politico says Beyond Coal, with the deep pockets of Michael Bloomberg behind it, is “the most extensive, expensive, and effective campaign in the club’s 123-year history, and maybe the history of the environmental movement.”

The coal industry, the report notes, now employs fewer people than the solar industry.

Read more: http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/green-building-news%2A#ixzz3hPEcOSfU 
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The Sierra Club has taken aim at all 523 coal-burning power plants in the U.S. with its Beyond Coal campaign. This plant is in central Wyoming.

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  1. renosteinke | Aug 01, 2015 06:00am | #1

    Figures don't lie- but liars can figure!

    This article makes you want to feel all warm and fuzzy, assuring us that evil coal is being replaced by lovely natural gas. Not quite.

    First off, our power needs can only increase. Why else the law telling us what light bulbs to use? The Sierra Club is but one special-interest group that has been doing its' best to hinder plant construction.

    Next, the Sierra Club has been doing as much as it can to hinder the production of natural gas. The most prominent example of this is their, and Obama's, obstruction of pipelines to deliver gas from the fields. Drilling for gas has been stopped wherever bureaucrats have a say in the matter.

    Employment figures are meaningless. If you're going to consider employment, look at it in terms of how many folks are needed to make how much power.

    Finally ... lower power bills? That must be what Goering had in mind when he described "the big lie." Power bills go only one way- UP! Any more of this 'saving' and I'll be broke. Look closer at the activities of the EPA, the Sierra Club, and their kind - and you'll see they're making every effort to make fuel prices increase.

    Want a concrete example? In Nevada, the activities of the Sierra Club helped prevent the power company from building a power plant near the coal mines - forcing the fuel to be hauled across the state. I submit it's a lot cheaper to send electricity over wire than it is to ship coal by rail.

    Mining of that same coal has also been actively opposed, forcing the utility to use natural gas. Coal's entire advantage is that it is a cheaper way to make electricity. By driving the cost of production UP, rates have to go UP. That's not "cheaper" in any way.

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