When the Biden administration in May rolled out its major plan to reduce CO2 emissions from electric power plants, the EPA concocted a way to keep legacy coal-fired plants in service – largely seen as a concession to the electric utility industry. The administration’s proposed coal plant rescue relies on carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).
The EPA provision on CCS, which EPA Administrator Michael Regan described as “proven, readily available,” raised many interested eyebrows. Grist commented, “Although the EPA says CCS technology is ‘adequately demonstrated’ and ‘highly cost effective,’ experts are deeply skeptical that it can deliver on its promised emissions reductions.” The AP reported, “Groups on both ends of the political spectrum questioned whether carbon capture and storage is a realistic solution.”
The administration has been putting big money where its proposed rules are, with Department of Energy loans, pilot projects, and tax credits. DOE has allocated some $2.5 billion for CCS projects.
Now, according to E&E News, “The utilities that control most of the country’s power plants aren’t rushing out to install carbon capture, even as the Biden administration offers the technology as a lifeline for fossil fuels.” E&E contacted 10 major electric generating companies for details about their views of CCS. The journalists found, “While a few pointed to active research projects, most said they do not have near-term plans for deployment on the timeline laid out in EPA’s draft rule to limit carbon pollution from power plants.”
The article notes that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was pushing CCS, acknowledging that it was, in the Chamber’s own words, the “loudest voices urging Congress” to push the technology. But now, says the nation’s largest business lobby, EPA claims that CCS is ready to roll are “dubious.”
Emily Sanford Fisher of the Edison Electric Institute, the Washington lobby for investor-owned utilities, indicated that the utilities also don’t accept the administration’s assertions about the maturity of CCS. “This is an industry that is not generally incentivized to work with emerging technologies,” she said. “Our regulatory structure does not love the risk involved in new technology.”
There is little EPA can point to that demonstrates CCS is nearly ready for prime CO2 reduction time. Last year, the Institute for Energy Efficiency and Financial Analysis, which follows CCS closely, noted, ““Using carbon capture as a greenlight to extend the life of fossil fuels power plants is a significant financial and technical risk: history confirms this.”
The only operational U.S. attempt at CCS is NRG Energy’s billion-dollar Petra Nova plant in Texas, which failed on economic and technical grounds in 2020 after starting up in 2017. The project resumed this May, with no results publicly reported since then. In North Dakota, a rural electric cooperative, Minnkota Power, is attempting to retrofit a 53-year-old generator to capture carbon and inject it underground nearby, Inside Climate News reported. The 700-MW Milton Young plant burns local lignite.
In an interview, Notre Dame professor and energy expert Emily Grubert told Inside Climate News, “I see all the press releases saying we’re really looking forward to this plant continuing to operate for decades to come, when I think it’s at the end of its life right now. The alternative to CCS would essentially be to shut the plant down, so this is not a situation where you are eliminating emissions from a plant that would have continued to operate anyway. Probably most coal plants only make it to 50-ish years before they need a major overhaul. So this is essentially a rebuild of the plant.”
“Probably most coal plants only make it to 50-ish years before they need a major overhaul. So this is essentially a rebuild of the plant.” — Emily Grubert, University of Notre Dame
Her insights are on target. Brattle Group’s Metin Celebi observed that utilities may find that it’s cheaper for their investors and their customers to shut down plants rather than put big, new capital expenditures in play. “It really comes down to cost for their customers in the long run, relative to other alternatives,” Celebi told E&E News.
An example is playing out in Detroit, where the Detroit Free Press reported Wednesday (July 12) that the local electric company, DTE Energy, will accelerate shut down of its 3,280-MW, 52-year-old coal-fired Monroe Power Plant, “one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in the United States — from 2035 to 2032, which the utility said will result in an 85% reduction in its carbon emissions nine years earlier than planned.”
The company said it will instead put its money, and considerable amounts of taxpayer funds in the form of tax credits, into new renewables. DTE said the move away from coal and toward wind and solar reduce future costs to its customers by around $2.5 billion, including saving $1.4 billion by shutting Monroe three years early.
–Kennedy Maize
This is the first of two articles on the big Biden bet on risky electric technologies for reducing CO2 emissions. Next: green, aka “clean”, hydrogen.
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