June 10, 2008

Dear Editor:

Contrary to several quotes in your June 9 story, "How Coal Got a Dirty Name," there is nothing to cheer about in the recent announcement that another coal-fired power plant in Illinois using modern pollution controls will not be built.  In reality, those stopping the new Will County plant are offering few viable solutions for meeting our state's growing energy needs.

The use of renewable energy and energy conservation are becoming increasingly important – as they should be. But the simple fact is that coal must be a part of our energy portfolio for years to come in order to ensure a reliable, affordable supply of electricity.  The people of Illinois get 37 percent of their electricity from coal.  No matter how many nuclear power plants or wind turbines or natural gas generators are built in Illinois, they can't realistically replace that amount any time soon.

And let’s not forget that there are groups fighting against new nuclear plants, other folks don’t want wind turbines dotting their landscape and this country’s natural gas reserves are decreasing. Every possible energy solution has a set of detractors trying to slow it down –or stop it altogether.

This is a huge problem since we end up debating whether coal or wind or nuclear or biofuels or natural gas or biomass or crude oil or solar or battery cells or conservation will be the answer. In reality, we’re going to need coal and wind and nuclear and biofuels and natural gas and biomass and crude oil and solar and battery cells and other sources -- including a huge dose of conservation -- to meet Illinois’ current and future energy needs at competitive prices.

This “and” approach to energy won’t be easy. Every one of these energy sources creates environmental issues and/or needs some kind of energy infrastructure that most people don’t want in their backyards. But what other approach can work to help us meet future demand in an energy hungry global marketplace? What other approach helps us diversify our energy portfolio while creating jobs and growing our state’s economy?

So instead of simply stopping the development of new energy infrastructure and celebrating the outcome, we should work together to invest in and encourage the development and availability of all kinds of energy in an environmentally responsible way.

We need to invest in clean coal technologies, including those that can reduce carbon dioxide emissions. But we also need to build pipelines that bring crude oil from Canada, modernize our refineries and power plants, allow new nuclear plants in Illinois, construct more wind turbines and a lot more to ensure Illinois has diversified energy sources to maintain and grow our economy and sustain our quality of life.

Accomplishing that would be something to cheer about.

Tom Wolf

Executive Director, Energy Council

Illinois Chamber of Commerce