Minnesota Power: Go slow on old coal
June 18, 2012 at 7:00 pm in Duluth News Tribune
Minnesota Power on Monday said it shouldn’t be rushed into closing its older, smaller coal-fired power plants until more research is done on the environmental benefits and economic impacts to customers. Continue Reading
Congratulations to MP&L for standing up to the environmental extremists and left-wing politicians. Upgrading these plants, should studies indicate feasible, would be the best for northeastern Minnesota. Obama will be gone in 6 months and then we can get back to business in this country, after 4 years of failed experiments with “green” energy. Good luck MP&L, I’m rooting for you and our residents.
Hot debate. What do you think?
25 
17
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Mercury_and_coal
“Coal-fired power plants are the largest source of mercury in the United States, accounting for about 41 percent (48 tons in 1999) of industrial releases. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, eight percent of American women of childbearing age had unsafe levels of mercury in their blood, putting approximately 322,000 newborns at risk of neurological deficits. Mercury exposure also can lead to increase cardiovascular risk in adults”
>>>>>>>>> above just one excerpt from link…pretty detailed history of coal emissions and regulations by EPA>>>>>>>>
The majority of coal plants that pollute are in midwest and wasn’t a study recently done that cited one out of 8 children in Twin Ports area had unsafe levels of Mercury? It causes neurological disorders in children which explains all the thumbs up for your post.
The plants in question are over 60 years old, multiple units at Laskin and Hoyt lakes facilities already been cited several times for their pollution. Minnesota power already paid for these plants long ago and been a cash cow for them and they knew this was coming for over 20 years but they need more time to do an environmental impact and economic feasibility study now? HUH?..Seriously…if they’ve never done one before this it hardly makes a sympathetic case for them that they’re the stewards concerned for our general health. I see it as a ploy to just get more money from squeezing the cash cow for all is worth a little longer knowing that will have to shut down anyway.
It’s not in our best interest that these antiquated coal plants continue to run for health reasons, it’s in Minnesota Powers interest they do for profit reasons.. It has nothing to do with left wing radicals which hardly think applies to Minnesota Dept. of Commerce which is also supportive of this….it has to do with what is in our best interests vs. what is in large corporations best interest…they rarely if ever are same.
Our most precious resources here is air quality and water quality and our general health….not corporate profits.
“We’ve got to pause and ask ourselves: How much clean air do we really need?”–Lee Iacocca
Like or Dislike:
7 
14
OK fastone, why don’t you lead by example then. Unplug your refrigerator, computer, t.v., disconnect your air conditioning and use candles instead of lights at night. Then, wind power might be able to provide enough power to run a computer and lightbulb at your place of work.
We understand coal isn’t the best option for energy, but wind and solar are incredibly inefficient and only have the capacity to provide 20% of our energy need. How do you propose making that other 80% up? Quickly build a bunch of nuclear reactors? Riiight. By acting swiftly and irrationally to close these coal fired power plants ASAP, your electricity costs will double or potentially triple because the remaining facilities simply do not have the capacity to make up for the lost energy. That large price increase applies to the poor and elderly also. How’s that going to work for them, doubling their utilities bill every month?
A more prudent path is to continue on the road to phasing these old coal plants out, but not simply cut them off and throw our entire economy and people into a tailspin – which is what MP and others are suggesting.
Like or Dislike:
4 
5
Mike…I’ve responded 4 prior times and each time they held up post and then deleted it. Not sure what problem was…each time rewrote posts… either didn’t like that I’ve been Mr. Green for over 35 years consuming less fossil fuel in year then most do in a month or my pointing out that it’s just unbelieveable to me that Mn. Power has never had a plan, not ever done a feasibility study for replacing 60 year old coal units that know are contaminating our air and water until now and are proclaiming they’re being rushed and need more time.
I am fine with minimum electricity btw, been conserving since 1978 energy crises and my electric bills are $22 a month and that’s for home and office. I got it in 1978 and been waiting for everyone else to “get it” ever since. I also consume less fossil fuel, have saved 30,000 gallons of heating fuel by converting to renewable energy source and that was again, over 30 years ago. For last 20 years my gas consumption at bare minimum and walk to store for shopping most weeks and limited my auto use and average under 4,000 miles a year in last 20 years and that’s only because of vacation trips otherwise a tank of gas lasts me almost 2 months. I work from home and use passive sunligh instead of lights. So I do only need enough electricity to run puter, which consumes hardly any and my frig and maybe a light for few hours at night. So nice try pretending to think you know me but you clearly don’t. Not type that would preach about conservation and fossil fuel pollution if wasn’t first personally living up to own convictions, that would make me a hypocrite. Even professionally, I could have worked within any industry but instead chose to work industry involved in energy conservation, which has even led to working with folks running big three’s electric vehicle programs and companies involved in wind generation.
Other thing posted was that 43% of our mercury contamination comes from coal burning generators and it impacts 322,000 unborn children a year and can have neurological ill effects. I’m sure Mn Power is well aware of that as well as the writing on wall for coal units been there for at least a decade..at least..but I guess it’s just all news to them…and they feel are being rushed and now need to do a feasibility study…
I wasn’t arguing your point that phasing them out needs to be done not just environmentally sound but also economically. My point was either they are fools for not already having done a feasibility study or they think I am and they can hoodwink me just so they can squeeze more profits out of 60 year old coal units.
Like or Dislike:
1 
0