Outdated coal-fired generators are being replaced with those that run on natural gas. The change in Muhlenberg County, once the nation's top producer of coal, is emblematic as natural gas becomes cheaper and U.S. electric utilities try to meet stiffer CO2 rules Obama announced recently. When the $1 billion natural gas facility is finished in 2017, the TVA will shut down two coal-burning units at Paradise that date to the 1960s.
Natural gas is "available, cheap and perceived to be secure for a long time into the future," said Charles Ebinger, director of the Energy Security Initiative at the Washington-based Brookings Institution. Read more at power-eng.com
