Alliant swapping coal for gas to cut costs, carbon; environmental advocates push for faster transition to renewable energy

TOWN OF BELOIT — With construction on a $700 million natural gas plant halfway done, Alliant Energy has shut down one of its largest coal-fired generators.

Friday marked the final day for Edgewater 4, a 49-year-old plant in Sheboygan that last year burned almost 950,000 tons of Wyoming coal, generating enough electricity to power about 200,000 average Wisconsin homes. It’s the third coal plant that Alliant has shut down since 2015.

The replacement, a 725-megawatt addition to Alliant’s Rock River campus in the town of Beloit, is on track to begin operation in 2020...

...Alliant says West Riverside will generate about half the carbon dioxide as a similar-sized coal plant, while emitting 99 percent less sulfur and virtually no mercury, pollutants that require expensive equipment to remove...

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Ken Notes: Natural gas is still a carbon based product and the size of these investments means they are here for a while. Fracking has of course made domestic natural gas very affordable and cost effective. Not to mention the years of capacity available.

I like the fact that these new systems fit in with truly renewable energy by providing co-gen capacity to make solar and wind viable mainstream resources. Now we need to find ways to decommission or convert the rest of the coal plants which still provide the majority of energy in the state.