Coal-fired plants represented more than 80% of the 18 GW in generation retired in 2015, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
The plants that retired were mostly built between 1950 and 1970, and the average capacity was 133 MW, compared to an average 278 MW of capacity for the coal-fired fleet still in operation. Nearly half of the retired coal capacity was in Ohio, Georgia and Kentucky.
About 30% of the plants that shut down in 2015 went cold in April, when EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxics Standards went into effect. A number of plants received a one-year extension, and they are expected to retire next month.
More: Energy Information Administration
EPA Expanding Methane Crackdown to Existing Wells
EPA announced it will require existing oil and natural gas wells to abide by tougher methane-emission regulations already covering new wells.
The announcement came during President Obama’s meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said the expansion of the rules was necessary if the U.S. was to reach its goal of cutting emissions by 40% by 2025. “Based on this growing body of science, it’s become clear it’s come time for EPA to take additional action,” she said.
The oil and natural gas industry reacted negatively. “The administration is catering to environmental extremists at the expense of American consumers,” said Kyle Isakower of the American Petroleum Institute.
More: Houston Chronicle
Solar Market Set to Grow 119% This Year
The U.S. solar generation market is set to increase 119% this year, mostly from utility-scale projects in the pipeline, according to GTM Research in its U.S. Solar Market Insight Year in Review, published in conjunction with the Solar Energy Industries Association.
The forecasted surge of 16 GW of solar that will be installed in 2016 was caused by the expected expiration of federal tax credits in 2016. The tax credit was extended, but not before investors committed their 2016 budgets to some big projects. Utility-scale installations are expected to decline in 2017.
The report said new community solar projects are also growing, and rooftop solar continues to drive solar demand.
More: Greentech Media
Jury Taps Shale Driller for $4.2M in Tainted Water Suit
A U.S. District Court jury in Scranton, Pa., hit Cabot Oil & Gas with a $4.2 million verdict, saying the company’s gas-drilling operations contaminated the well water of two Pennsylvania families.
The families in the Susquehanna County town of Dimock alleged that their water was contaminated by methane after Cabot began drilling in the area. Cabot argued that the methane occurred naturally and was not caused by the company’s action. It vowed to appeal the verdict.
More: Reuters
NRC Annual Assessment Shows 96 of 99 Plants in Top 2 Categories
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission released its annual assessment of nuclear power plant operations for 2015, and all but three units were graded in the two highest categories. Of the 96 highest-performing reactors, 85 fully met all safety and security objectives, the commission said.
Arkansas Nuclear One Units 1 and 2 and the Pilgrim plant in Massachusetts were ranked in the fourth category and will receive increased oversight. The Arkansas units landed in the category because of two significant safety findings during inspections, and Pilgrim because of “long-standing issues of low to moderate safety significance,” according to an NRC news release.
Entergy owns both the Arkansas and Pilgrim plants.
More: Nuclear Regulatory Commission
US Nuclear Fleet Safer After Fukushima, NRC Says
Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Stephen Burns said that changes the agency instituted after the earthquake-induced meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi plant have made the U.S. fleet safer.
“I think the plants are safer than they were five years ago,” Burns told Bloomberg BNA. “A lot of the things we’ve done, I believe, have made a safe situation safer.”
The changes, such as second sets of backup generation, batteries and pumps, addressed failures exposed at Fukushima, said Tony Pietrangelo, senior vice president and chief nuclear officer of the Nuclear Energy Institute. “When you boil it down to its basic, root causes, they lost electricity and they lost the ability to cool the [reactor] core, to maintain the containment integrity and to cool the spent fuel,” he said.
More: Bloomberg BNA
Fire Prompts ‘Unusual Event’ at Watts Bar 2
A pump motor serving the reactor at the Watts Bar 2 nuclear station caught fire, forcing a declared “unusual event” before the Tennessee Valley Authority’s newest station produced any power.
The small fire Wednesday in one of three hot-well pump motors was extinguished within 19 minutes, but the incident required TVA to declare a “Notice of an Unusual Event.”
“Plant personnel extinguished the motor fire, and there was no danger to the public,” TVA spokesman Jim Hopson said. “Other Watts Bar Unit 2 systems were unaffected. Watts Bar Unit 1 was also unaffected and remained safely online throughout the event.”
More: Chattanooga Times Free Press
Studies Show Undersea Cables Don’t Repel Marine Creatures
A trio of recent studies show that magnetic fields emitted by undersea transmission cables don’t seem to harm marine wildlife, a finding that could boost the development of offshore wind energy.
Earlier generations of cables, including undersea telecommunication cables, attracted wildlife such as sharks, which sometimes bit into the cables. Insulating the cables caused the sharks to lose interest, but magnetic radiation prompted some researchers to wonder if the cables served as “electric fences.”
The recent research suggests the magnetic fields don’t affect marine life. “There’s much less concern now,” said Ann Bull, a marine biologist at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, who presented two of the studies at the American Geophysical Union’s Ocean Sciences Meeting. Her experiments showed that even where magnetic fields were strongest, creatures such as crabs did not seem bothered.
More: Science News