Virginia to Coal: "Go Away"

It was a big day in the Virginia energy world yesterday, as we heard the news that the Environmental Appeals Board (EAB) of the EPA potentially put a kibosh on any new coal-fired power plant development in the US. Regarding the coal plant in Wise County, sources tell me that this decision will not immediately stop construction, but gives us a very powerful precedent to review this plant on the grounds that it will emit tremendous amounts of CO2 - a pollutant. It will be up the executive branch to enforce the rule on plants like the Wise County plant that were permitted after the 2007 Supreme Court decision defining CO2 as a pollutant.

Susanna at CCAN lays it out:

The EPA ruling sets a very persuasive precedent in our case against Dominion's Wise County coal plant. The State Air Pollution Control Board did not include CO2 as a pollutant when they were permitting the plant-largely because the EPA hadn't ruled that CO2 was a pollutant. Now that that's change, the plant should go back to the State Air Pollution Control Board where they would be required to make a decision on CO2. As far as a deal-breaker, at this time, it's not. As a breath of fresh reason, it's quite refreshing and long overdue.

In other news, the Governor's Climate Commission met yesterday. While the Commission can only "recommend" positions to the Governor, they basically called BS on Governor Kaine's climate and coal positions. The panel adopted Bill Greenleaf's proposal to impose a mandatory energy efficiency goal of reducing Virginia's projected energy use by 19% by 2025.  The Commission also came within one vote of asking for a policy statement that called for no new coal pants in Virginia until we achieve Carbon-capture and sequestration (CCS). (AKA: Not soon.)  That one missing vote was Governor Kaine's Secretary of Natural Resources Perston Bryant.

As if all that wasn't enough to take the gem out of King Coal's proverbial donut in Virginia - our state's voters just wiped the floor with three global warming deniers (Gilmore, Drake, Goode).

That was the old.

This is the new...

Tom Perriello:

When I think about the threat to our climate, its our number one national security threat, its our number one environmental threat, and its our top economic opportunity. This is the jobs engine of the next generation. Its alternative energy, clean energy, and the 5th district can be at the forefront of that

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