I got an e-mail this week from someone detailing 46 different coal fired power plant proposals that were cancelled or shelved around the United States this year. One of them is Excelsior Energy’s $2.3 billion boondoggle Mesaba Energy Project. There will be no new coal fired power plants — even if they use “clean coal” technology — until this nation sets a long range carbon policy. When Congress and the President do that, the industry push will be to retrofit old coal plants (as you’re already seeing from Minnesota Power and Xcel). If there is any demand for new coal plants (and there may not be) the push will be to build them in cost effective places near coal and carbon capture land. Mesaba’s ridiculous plan to build a “sorta clean coal” plant on the impenetrable Iron Range geology with hopes of getting another billion dollars to build a carbon pipeline to North Dakota does not qualify.
Why am I saying this? When a consultant or a developer or an “expert” tells you that Excelsior will absolutely be able to build this plant within a few years they are either lying or incompetent. We’d all do ourselves a favor by moving on to more realistic projects.
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