The new energy trajectory in the Southeast
The new energy trajectory in the Southeast
December 30, 2015
Carbon dioxide emissions dropped 29 percent throughout the region between 2005-2013, even while population in the Southeast rose 10 percent. (© SELC)
Cutting coal
Ten years ago, there were 246 coal-fired units generating electric power in our region, and nine more huge units were planned. Coal-fired power accounted for the Souths outsized contribution to climate change and emitted enormous amounts of soot-forming sulfur dioxide, smog-forming nitrogen dioxide, and nearly 100 percent of the mercury, arsenic, and selenium contaminating our waterways.
Today, 126 of the existing unitsa third of the total coal capacity in our six statesare slated for retirement by around 2020; most of them are already closed. And seven of the proposed units never got off the ground.
SELC has been deeply involved in this revolution, securing plans or legally binding retirement commitments and turning aside most of the proposed new plants, while ensuring that the two that were built burn as cleanly as possible. These developments played a major role in reducing emissions from electric power generation in our region down 29 percent between 2005 and 2013even as the population of the Southeast increased by an estimated 10 percent.
These changes have come without increasing the average home electricity bill. And despite all the rhetoric, most of our states are already well on their way to meeting their goals under the Environmental Protection Agencys historic Clean Power Plan, the first-ever limits on electricity-sector CO2.
Much of this progress came from applying an economic principle in the courtroom. SELC figured if we could force utilities to pay the true costs of a coal-based energy systemwhat economists call internalizing costwe could create powerful incentives to close coal plants.
We also had the legal expertise to make sure that coal-fired power plants included all the pollution control technology required by law and met the strictest environmental standards....
https://www.southernenvironment.org/news-and-press/news-feed/the-souths-new-energy-trajectory