TOO FUNNY! Excelsior, coal gasification…
November 14th, 2006
The Webstermeistress of mncoalgasplant.com and I were on the horn last night organizing the PUC files for the Excelsior Mesaba coal gasification project, and just now, she sent this missive:
Did you know that the combination of words Excesior Energy, Mesaba Project and Boondoggle, Pork are searched for on the internet 10 times a day – every day…
Now that’s a day brightener as I dig through piles and piles of papers looking for documents for our “Exhibit List” to submit tomorrow.
Lots of Mesaba documents are here on Legalectric, and there’s a lot more on the mncoalgasplant.com site. Check it out! Everything you ever wanted to know about coal gasification and lots they don’t want you to know!
Excelsior doesn’t want a hearing…
November 13th, 2006
Yes, it’s true. Excelsior, at the 11.5th hour, sends around an email that they and Xcel will stipulate not to cross-examine each others witnesses. Ja, your point? You think it’s wise to have a demonstration coal gasification project the size of Mesaba, 600MW-1,200MW, with the impacts of Mesaba, deemed too risky to attract private investment without the DOE’s guaranteed loans, to advance this to the PUC without a hearing? At the 11.5th hour before the hearing, I’m trying to get out of my bunny slippers, get the dogs fed and peed and pooped and out the door and there’s suddenly all this stuff to print off, gee, thanks guys. Lucky for me, and lucky for them too, it wasn’t just yours truly objecting, Big Stone II was objecting too. WHEW! The bedfellows in this deal are altogether too strange. Talk about legal whores… but hey, we’re all whores on this planet!
And I swear, in the list of exhibits I want admitted, both Byron Starns and Tom Osteraas said they didn’t know what the Wabash River Final Technical Report is. Oh, PLEEEEEEAZE… remember, that’s the one that exposed all the plant’s water contamination problems, with juicy things like selenium, cyanide and arsenic. From that report:
Elevated levels of selenium, cyanide and arsenic in the waste water have caused the process waste water to be out of permit compliance. Daily maximum values, though not indicated in the table above, were routinely exceeded for selenium and cyanide, and only occasionally for arsenic. The Project participants have been working closely with IDEM on remediation plans tobring the Project waste water in compliance.
Wabash Final Technical Report, p. 6-14. What will wastewater treatment cost? And without a hearing, how will that be addressed? And it turns out that in the history of this site, it’s one of the most downloaded documents! And same goes for mncoalgasplant.com — a recommended hot read on a cold night!
It’s over… winners and losers!
November 13th, 2006
I’m still utterly bummed out about Hatch, and the session is looming. But a lot of folks I know will now grace those halls, and it is going to be different, kick ass instead of an ass-kicking, though I’ll try to find some reason to harrass Steve Sviggum before he resigns (wonder who he’s been grooming down there). Here’s one of the biggest losers:
Some of the winners:
I’m thrilled Tom Anzelc got in for House 3A. He was in the middle of Prairie Island I, and at the Progressive DFL Caucus a while back we went toe to toe in a delightfully heated exchange, until he figured out I know the score on that 1994 bill, well, I had to hit him over the head with that. I trust he’ll do well in the SOB because he has the backbone to stand up for regular people.
Further south, in Chisago, Jeremy Kalin beat Pete Nelson in House 17B. Jeremy is a progressive community activist who was part of Concerned River Valley Citizens on the Chisago Transmission Line, and he’s probably the first potter in the legislature!
David Bly won by 57 votes, and from the inbox, “SERIOUSLY!!! Bly won!” and “How did that happen?” and “I didn’t see that one coming…” And Doug Jones’ reaction would be choice! Ray lost a LOT of votes in Northfield, and Bly didn’t lose as many (but didn’t do as well as Peterson), and a strange thing happened in Northfield W-2 P-2. Here’s Bly and Edwards in 2004:
Here at home, Sandy Wollschlager took 28A, an open seat vacated by Republican Jerry Dempsey. I got several mailboxes full of HRCC Independent Expenditure flyesr, like the flip-flop flyer, another mispreresenting her service on the School Board, and Iocco has the nerve to claim SHE was running a negative campaign — show me the evidence Gary, because the floor of my porch is littered with HRCC crap and nothing like that from the DFL! Here she is election night, on the phone with the Republican… errr… Beagle, yeah, that’s it… learning that Gary Iocco had conceded (and not all that long after we’d been confident enough for the first toast to the winner and the first bottle of champagne blew open!).
Further south in House 31B, Ken Tschumper,a LeCrescent dairy farmer, gave Greg Davids a long overdue Tschumping! Here he is with his father and his favorite cow:
Here’s another winner that night, Jim Carlson of SD 38, who ran hard and benefitted from Andrew Borene’s crash and burn in SD41 and withdrew in disgrace (and the DFL sends out sample ballots with Borene’s name? Whatever were they thinking?) because Jim inherited Borene’s campaign worker and Senate support. Not long ago, he’d invited me to speak at a powerlunchbunch in St. Paul about energy issues and of course the Red Wing background checks, where Pat hollered “Senator Carlson!” and Jim was oblivious — get used to it SENATOR CARLSON!
Lots of wins, a change in direction is assured.. but… Hatch’s loss is going to hurt a long time. Kenya is still whining, and Krie is on the lookout for Republican Whores!
New Coal Generation in the MISO queue
November 12th, 2006
Fumin’ and flaming and fired up and all lit up and all of the above — as a double Sagittarian fire is my essence, but sometimes it gets all consuming!
I’ve been looking over the MISO queue of new generation and am just so damn disgusted. Here there’s all this hot air about CO2 and yet there’s all this coal generation going up and now that there’s transmission through Minnesota, what’s to stop it? Hot air about CO2 won’t!
Let’s do the numbers for CO2 output of this NEW generation:
a) 26,579.2MW in MISO region
b) 8,169MW in MN, ND and SD
Mesaba 600MW spews 616 tons of CO2/hr, which is bad enough. The plants proposed are regular coal, which spew 720 tons CO2/hour = 1.2 tons/MW/hr
a) 26,579.2MW x 1.2 x 24 x 365 = 279,400,550.4 tons CO2 annually
b) 8,169MW x 1.2 x 24 x 365 = 85,872,528 tons CO2 annually
So, we’re facing 85,872,528 NEW ADDITIONAL tons of CO2 annually in MN, ND and SD.
279,400,550.4 tons NEW ADDITIONAL tons of CO2 annually in MISO region
We’re going backwards. Meanwhile, there’s all this hot air about CO2, earth to mars, we know there’s a problem and we really don’t need to hear any more about it, we don’t need to be spending resources and taking precious time to preach to the choir and fidde while coal burns. What are all these funded folks yammering about CO2 doing to stop it? What are they doing to stop the transmission that’s enabled it? What are they doing to stop CapX2020… oh, I forgot, they made a deal to allow it… What are they doing to stop American Transmission Company – ATC’s transmission through Wisconsin?
It’s time for NEXT STEPS!
Stay tuned, and come to the Green Party meeting on December 9 at the St. James Hotel…
Here’s the link for the MISO queue: MISO Queue
And this technodolt has figured out how to import the html MISO queue into a spreadsheet, because we all need a cute little Excel spreadsheet that’s sortable. Sheet 1 is the MISO Queue in its entirety as of now; Sheet 2 is just the coal, all 26,579.2MW in just the MISO region; Sheet 3 is the coal in just MN, SD and ND, 8,169MW. Here’s that spreadsheet:
miso-queue-with-coal-separated-out-sheet-2.xls
Here’s the MISO Queue (edited) for MN, ND and SD:
CAMP on Coal Gasification Economic Issues
November 11th, 2006
Citizens Against the Mesaba Project has published a critique of the economic impact “studies” provided in Excelsior’s application and offered by Excelsior as evidence in the Power Purchase Agreement for the Mesaba coal gasification project.
Here’s CAMP’s Economic Analysis:
Here’s the Camp Press Release, published in BusinessNorth:
11/10/2006
Citizens Against the Mesaba Project has responded to the claims of economic benefits for Itasca County to be expected from the proposed Mesaba Energy Project.
In its recently released position paper, CAMP points out that the two studies relied on by the Itasca Economic Development Corporation in its support for the Project are not reliable indicators of economic benefit.
The studies, commissioned from the UMD Labovitz School of Business by Excelsior Energy and the IEDC, are not cost-benefit analyses, and their authors caution that they should not be used to determine policies or make decisions.
CAMP points out that the qualifications of the developer are questionable. Mesaba I would be the first project for Excelsior Energy and eight of its nine top executives held positions with NRG Energy, Inc., an energy-producing company that grew aggressively in the 1990s and had to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2003.
CAMPâ??s primary focus is on the flaws of the UMD studies. These include unverified data from Excelsior Energy used as input, and projections of millions of dollars in â??value added spendingâ? that donâ??t take into account that most of these dollars will flow out of the county and the state.
CAMPâ??s concerns are supported by evidence being introduced in the pending proceeding before the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) related to Excelsiorâ??s attempt to force Xcel Energy to purchase the 603 MW of electrical output from Mesaba I. The Minnesota Department of Commerce has concluded that there are financial and business risks and the proposed plant is not likely to be a least-cost resource, as required by Minnesota law. The Minnesota Chamber of Commerce has concluded that the net economic benefits to the state are likely to be negative. Minnesota Power has raised concerns about: the lack of rail and coal contracts; a gasification technolgy that has not been proven to work on such a large scale or using sub-bituminous coal; making unrealistic environmental promises; and using up already scarce and valuable air shed needed to meet permit requirements for other viable northeastern Minnesota projects that would use existing natural resources.
CAMP has concluded that Itasca County should consider the identified financial and operational
risks, as well as the risk of serious detriment to the clean air and water that attracts visitors and residents.
Without a proper cost-benefit analysis that considers the costs to tourism and recreation, decreased land values, public health and the environment, there is no basis for concluding that this Project would benefit Itasca County.
Contact: Charlotte Neigh (218) 245-1844
Moments later, what should appear on the BusinessNorth site? What a coincidence — methinks we got their attention! But look what they’re saying, given bold emphasis below — 6,00MW needed in the STATE, which is utter crap. The 6,000MW figure comes from the Capx2020 Technical Update , found at their site under “About Us” (every time I try to get there, everything freezes up, go figure). You’ll find the boundaries of that “region” on p. 4, and then take a close look at the map on p. 7 that shows all the new generation, all 16,712MW of it. And then, when you compare the CapX2020 load growth estimates, that’s WAAAAAAY different than those of the 1005 NERC Load and Capability report, which states that MAPP has overestimated its growth and the region’s growth had really risen only 0.6% in the prior year. That’s reflected in the Xcel IRP, which shows that the biggest power load in the state, bigger than all others combined, doesn’t need baseload capacity until 2015 and then it needs only 375MW. Here’s Xcel’s Baseload Need Assessment. In short, the 6,000MW “need” for the REGION is exaggerated and is more than met by planned generation. Here’s the MISO queue of planned generation. Shortage? Yeah, right…
Expert testimony on Mesaba Energy Project demonstrates it is the most cost-effective baseload power solution for Minnesota
11/10/2006
Minnetonka – Excelsior Energy announced that it has filed testimony of nationally recognized experts on the subjects at issue in its docket before the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC), seeking approval of its proposed power contract with Xcel Energy.Power would be supplied under the contract from the first unit of the Mesaba Energy Project, an integrated gasification combined-cycle (IGCC or coal gasification) plant under development near Taconite, Minn.
The power contract is presently pending before an administrative law judge who is scheduled to make findings of fact and recommendations to the MPUC in February of 2007. The MPUC is expected to make its decision in the spring of 2007. All material permits and required transmission planning is underway and construction is scheduled to commence on the Mesaba Project in early 2008, with completion scheduled for 2011.
The Mesaba Energy Project will meet a portion of the need for more than 6000 MW of new generating capacity needed in Minnesota by 2020, cited by utilities and the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce as being critical to the Stateâ??s energy security. Nationwide, the North American Electric Reliability Council reports that demand for electricity will increase by 141,000 MW but projected resources will increase by only 57,000 MW in the next decade.
Testimony in the administrative proceeding has been provided by 19 expert witnesses, including Professor Jim Chen from the University of Minnesota Law School, who is a national expert in the field of regulated industries, Andrew Weissman, Senior Managing Director of FTI Consulting Inc. in Washington D.C., Roger Gale, President and CEO of GF Energy LLC in Washington D.C., Edward C. Bodmer of Lisle, Illinois, a senior energy economic analyst with Pace Global Energy Services LLC, Margaret A. Meal, a chartered financial analyst from San Francisco, California, Douglas Cortez from Hensley Energy Consulting LLC in Orange County, California, and Edward N. Steadman, Senior Research Advisor at the Energy and Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota.
Julie Jorgensen, co-CEO of Excelsior Energy, said, â??These experts conclude that the Mesaba Energy Project is the best choice for the state to reduce increasing reliance on natural gas as a fuel for power generation, and to meet increasing baseload power demand while minimizing environmental impacts. In addition, the experts confirm that the proposed power purchase agreement will protect Xcelâ??s customers from significant risks that customers would otherwise bear if Xcel builds its own baseload plant.
Finally, the expert analysis demonstrates that the cost of output from the Mesaba Project is comparable to the costs associated with a conventional coal alternative, and provides consumers with a hedge against the costs of complying with tightening emission limits and future limits on greenhouse gas emissions.â?
Copies of Excelsiorâ??s testimony may be obtained at http://www.excelsiorenergy.com/public/filings_frame.html.
About Excelsior Energy
Excelsior Energy Inc. is an independent energy company focused on the rapid market penetration of coal gasification technology to meet the nationâ??s increasing demand for electric energy with significantly reduced environmental impacts. In 2001, the Mesaba Energy Project was established to bring an integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) plant to Minnesotaâ??s Iron Range. The management team includes industry veterans in the electric utility, independent power, environmental and project development areas. The company website is: www.excelsiorenergy.com.
CONTACT: Will Harrington, 952-847-2372
E-mail: williamharrington@excelsiorenergy.com
AND I TRUST YOU ALL KNOW BY NOW THAT YOU CAN GET ALL THE TESTIMONY IN THE POWER PURCHASE AGREEMENT BY GOING OVER ON THE UPPER RIGHT HERE AND CLICKING ON “MESABA COAL GASIFICATION TESTIMONY!” (everything, not just the testimony Excelsior wants you to see).