Richmond, CA — Today, the Richmond City Council reached a monumental settlement with the Levin-Richmond Terminal Corporation to phase out the storage of coal and petcoke in the city by the end of 2026. The settlement closes the chapter on a legal fight between the City of Richmond and three fossil fuel companies after Richmond passed an ordinance phasing out the handling of coal and petcoke in the city over three years. Environmental groups represented by Earthjustice quickly intervened in the lawsuit to defend the ordinance alongside the City of Richmond.
Atlanta, GA -- Southern Company, the nation’s third largest utility, has announced plans to close most of its coal burning units at Plant Scherer, Plant Bowen, and Plant Wansley in Georgia, in addition to its coal units at Plant Gaston and Plant Barry in Alabama. The utility announced during its quarterly earnings report on Thursday that the closures will occur by 2028.
David Rogers, Southeast Deputy Regional Director for the Beyond Coal Campaign, released the following statement:
Today the Wisconsin Public Service Commission voted to approve We Energy’s proposal for a new Liquified Natural Gas storage (LNG) facilities in Ixonia and Bluff Creek. With an announcement by We Energy parent company WEC Energy Group earlier this week to move away from coal by 2035, as well as a swath of other proposed projects across the state, the approval signifies a decisive pivot by Wisconsin utilities to double down on gas that is facked and piped from other states. The new proposals have advocacy groups concerned about continuing climate and economic costs of fossil fuels.
Little Rock, AR -- Entergy Arkansas, the state’s largest monopoly electric utility, pivoted away from plans to build fracked natural gas power plants in its long-range energy plan filed with the Arkansas Public Service Commission last week.
This evening, the Arizona Corporation Commission disallowed $215.5 million of Arizona Public Service’s requested costs for “selective catalytic reduction” pollution controls at its Four Corners coal-burning power plant. Despite evidence in APS’s own modeling indicating that continuing to operate Four Corners was a losing bet for ratepayers, the utility sunk hundreds of millions into this aging, dirty, and expensive coal plant.
Today, Wisconsin’s largest utility, WEC Energy Group, announced intentions to transition to coal-free electricity generation by 2035, though did not announce specific plans for either the Elm Road or Weston coal fired power plants. The move is in line with previously announced goals to reduce carbon emissions, but advocates reiterated that shifting to other fossil fuel resources would continue to raise serious climate concerns.
GLASGOW, SCOTLAND -- Today, the annual United Nations Climate Negotiations (COP26) began in Glasgow, with thousands of attendees from across the globe convening for climate action and discussions. The event began with Bloomberg Philanthropies announcing a huge new initiative aiming to close 25% of the world’s remaining coal plants—and all of the proposed plants—by 2025.
In response, the Sierra Club’s International Climate and Policy Campaign Director, Cherelle Blazer, issued the following statement:
In an important victory for clean water in Montana, a Montana district court judge ruled on Thursday that the Montana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) repeatedly ignored the law and failed to protect water quality from an expansion of the Rosebud coal strip mine near Colstrip, one of the largest coal strip mines in the nation. The Western Environmental Law Center, Earthjustice, Roger Sullivan and Walton Morris represented the Montana Environmental Information Center and Sierra Club in this case.
Kansas City, KS - Evergy could retire its Jeffrey and La Cygne coal plants and replace them with a lower cost and reliable clean energy portfolio as soon as 2025 and 2028, according to the Kansas Pays the Price Volume 2 report released today by Sierra Club. Retiring these coal plants could save customers between $333 million and $869 million based on how quickly Evergy retires them.
Harrisburg, PA — Today, the Pennsylvania Senate passed SCRRR1 disapproving of a regulation enabling Pennsylvania to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). Under the Regulatory Review Act, today is the deadline for each chamber to approve a concurrent resolution to block the regulation and stop Pennsylvania from joining RGGI. However, Governor Wolf has pledged to veto it to ensure the state joins the emissions reduction initiative in 2022.
Oklahoma City, OK -- In a filing submitted to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission (OCC) on Wednesday, Sierra Club was critical of the non-existent public engagement process and utility oversight role of the OCC while offering recommendations for improvement.
Today, DTE Energy announced it will stop burning coal at its Belle River Power Plant by 2028, two years earlier than previously planned, in response to the U.S. EPA’s Steam Effluent Limitation Guidelines rule. That rule requires coal-fired power plants to either clean up their toxic wastewater pollution or stop burning coal. The company also announced it will move up the filing of its next Integrated Resource Plan by one year, to the fall of 2022. Lastly, the company announced it will explore repowering the Belle River plant with fossil gas.