Earth Equity News

TVA to Shutter Coal Plants and Turn to Nuclear. By Dave Flessner, Chattanooga Times, August 21, 2010. "TVA will shutter part of its aging fleet of coal power plants and turn to nuclear power and energy conservation to power the Tennessee Valley under a 10-year plan adopted on August 20. TVA President Tom Kilgore outlined a vision that calls for the nation's biggest government utility to idle at least 1,000 megawatts of coal generation -- or more than 7% of its biggest source of power -- by 2015. TVA directors approved plans to move ahead with reviving work on its unfinished Bellefonte Nuclear Plant in Alabama and restructuring electric rates next spring to encourage distributors -- and ultimately customers -- to limit consumption during peak demand periods. 'We want to be a leader in cleaner energy and cleaner air, and that means we will have to be less reliant upon coal,' Kilgore said. 'That doesn't mean that coal is going away, but we are looking at idling some of our coal units pretty soon.' TVA got more than 60% of its electricity last year from the 59 coal-fired units at its 11 fossil plants across Tennessee, Alabama and Kentucky. Before now, the only TVA-built plant to ever close was the Watts Bar Steam Plant in Rhea County, which was shuttered in 1983."