Clean Energy Insight - Moving Energy Forward

( By Mike Bullard )

With heavy emphasis placed on the use of natural gas for complimentary energy capacity in the recent American Clean Energy and Security Act, it is necessary to question if the use of natural gas delivers as a “green” energy. If the goal of this bill is to reduce CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions, why are we relying on natural gas for base load or mid-load capacity with this bill?

Natural gas produces half the CO2 emissions of traditional coal and no trace amounts of carbon monoxide, nitrous oxides, mercury, etc.  For comparison, clean coal with carbon capture has only 15% of the CO2 emmissions of a traditional coal plant, so natural gas produces over 3 times more CO2 emissions than clean coal technology would.  Why aren’t we seeing anti-natural gas ads on TV?

Furthermore, there aren’t enough natural reserves of natural gas in the United States to rely heavily on natural gas, but this is what’s happening.  Natural gas power plants are quick and inexpensive to build, but the natural gas is an expensive fuel to burn.  Natural gas has had a history of regulatory ups-and-downs which have recently skyrocketed its price.  Many plants have been sitting idle for years because of the high cost of natural gas.

Additionally, many utilities, depending on state regulations, are not permitted to pass capital costs (the costs of building the power plants) on to the consumers, but they are allowed to pass fuel costs to consumers.  It’s in the consumer’s best interests for the utility to provide the cheapest energy possible, but conflictingly, it’s in the utility’s best interest to keep capital costs as low as possible, even at the expense of high energy production costs which they are allowed to pass to the rate payers.

This is related to what happened in Missouri recently, AmerenUE was planning to build a new nuclear power plant in the state, but a State Senate filibuster stopped the ban on passing capital costs to rate payers from being lifted.  Extreme environmentalists thought this was a good thing.  I wish them luck getting solar and wind power built in Missouri if capital costs can’t be passed on.

A nuclear plant would have been much greener and more cost effective to the rate payers in the long run (~9-10 years) than would natural gas.  The nuclear plant would have created a lot more high-paying jobs as well.

Eventually, domestic natural gas reserves will run low.  We will spend billions creating ways to transport natural gas from foreign countries (Russia and the Middle East), just to put ourselves at the mercy of our foreign suppliers–a story that is eerily familiar.  All of this for an energy source that is neither cheap nor “green.”