Northfield’s Book Sale starts on Tuesday!
April 20th, 2008
From the Northfield Hospital Auxiliary’s site:
This Northfield book sale is the book sale of book sales, not to be missed, the mother of all book sales. Even when utterly destitute, it’s the one sale I really try to get to. Well, it’s not a Grateful Dead show, but there’s nothing like it, a hockey rink full of used books, and even some good electrical tomes!
Gov’s Greenhouse Gasbags Report
April 19th, 2008
When I look at the Green Chameleon Gov’s Greenhouse Gasbags’ Report, words fail me, good thing… we don’t need more CO2. But it’s so absurd, the assumptions are so bizarre, counterintuitive, where do I even begin? I think I’ll just post it first until I find the words. But that itself is a problem, because they have it all divided up, compartmentalized as it were, and it’s hard to get the whole thing. So I downloaded them and combined into the Report and the Appendices, while downloading I had the pleasure of watching a doe feeding just up the bluff, about 35 feet up from my door. Anyway, here we go:
From their site:
Public Comments – The deadline for public comment is midnight Sunday, April 27, 2008.
The link to the online form for submitting comments is:
www.commerce.state.mn.us/ClimateChangeResponse.html
The form is weird because it’s the only way I see to be able to comment, there are no email addresses… GRRRRRRRR… and they say: “You will need to fill-in and submit one web-based comment form for each policy option on which you are commenting.” And it seems that ONLY these web-form submitted comments will become part of the bigger report: “All comments submitted through the website will become part of the final report to the Governor and legislature after April 27th, 2008.”
So I’d recommending cutting and pasting into the form, keeping the comments in their entirety in another document, and then send separately to our agency buddies, just for giggles:
Now, why would I think this Gasbag report is a load o’ crap? Try this:
The generation performance standard (GPS) is a mandate that requires entities that deliver electricity to acquire electricity or power plant developers to build and operate new base-load generation, with a per-unit emission rate below 1,100 pounds of CO2 per megawatt-hour (MWh). For base-load projects that are part of a combined-heat-and-power project, the GPS would be raised to 1,300 pounds of CO2/MWh. By MCCAG vote, the two proposed new coal stations for meeting Minnesota base-load demand—Big Stone 2 and Mesaba—were exempted from the GPS. At its final meeting, MCCAG decided that this policy required further study.
Gasbag Report, Ch. 4, p. 5, para. ES-1. “MCCAG vote, the two proposed new coal stations for meeting Minnesota base-load demand—Big Stone 2 and Mesaba—were exempted from the GPS.” Excuuuuuse me, but how will exemption of 10 million new, NEW, tons of CO2 annually do anything but put us back, worse off then before we started? The gall, the audacity, whatever are they thinking? show me how they’ll make up that 10 million tons much less have any net decrease? What’s the point.
Oh, and here it is again, in the Executive Summary, p. EX 10:
All totals are relative to the underlying assumption that electricity expansion in Minnesota proceeds with the recently legislated Conservation Improvement Program (CIP), Renewable Energy Standard (RES), and all planned additions including the Mesaba and Big Stone 2 stations.
And we’re supposed to take the time to evaluate this piece o’ crap? How can they put something like this out into the world?
Past supporters now oppose Kandiyohi
April 17th, 2008
There was the Comment to MPCA by Carl Nelson, Green Institute, laying out problems with the Kandiyohi Midtown Eco-Crapper:
Shortly therefter, Carol Pass of East Phillips Improvement Coalition, renounced the organization’s prior support of the Kandiyohi Midtown Eco-Crapper.
The separation and opposition grows, and I’m finally getting around to posting a couple of letters from important past supporters of the project who are no longer, and who have voiced critical and specific concerns. This letter is reprinted with express permission:
David Morris Letter to City of Mpls – Opposition to Kandiyohi – April 2008
And now there’s Jeff Cook Coyle, who used to be the Manager of the Phillips Community Energy Co-op, associated with Green Institute, which was a partner in the Midtown Eco-Crapper before Krause left the Green Institute, becoming Kandiyohi, with the Midtown Eco-Crapper in tow. This email is reprinted with express permission:
Jeff Cook Coyle to legislators – opposing Kandiyohi – April 2008
Yes, I would say there’s a trend here! The Midtown Eco-Crapper is going up in flames as a bad burner should!
Prairie Island nuclear plant relicensing
April 17th, 2008
(update at bottom, maybe success?!?)
Why do I feel like I’m caught in a Wellstone ad or Michael Moore film… all I’m looking for is the Prairie Island nuclear plant relicensing application. It’s in the news, it’s in the paper, it’s on the radio, and it sure isn’t anywhere to be found!
MPR – Xcel requests extensions on nuclear plant licenses
STrib – Xcel seeks 20 year extensions on two nuclear reactors
Somebody has applied for relicensing of the Prairie Island nuclear generating plant. Who? Xcel? Nuclear Management Company? Damned if I know, and I’ve been digging for a while. two days now, and It’s elusive as hell, and that’s when my red flags go up and I start digging like my big black doggie going after a tennis ball stuck under the shelves.
First, I called NMC, because they’re the operator and the phone was answered by someone who hadn’t a clue, and I was transferred to someone who at least knew what I was talking about but had to refer me to someone in “Communications.”
Then I called Xcel, figuring if it was a project I had any interest in, poor Jimbo Alders would be stuck with it. Yup, he’d been working on it, and he was out, so they transferred me to Mark Suel (sp?) and I left a message.
So let’s look on the web:
It’s not on the Nuclear Management Company website
There’s nothing on the Xcel website. Monticello Relicensing is there, but Prairie Island? Nada…
By this time, I was getting a little irritated, and so called Amber Mensen, the Beagle reporter, to find out if she had a copy or knew where a copy was. Nope, no help or direction there…
Xcel’s Maria Martinka called in response to some call or message, and she hadn’t a clue and was conflating all the dockets (uprate, storage increase, and plant relicensing) and the Monticello and Prairie Island plants, and referred me to the NRC website. Reactors, Materials and Other Hearings.
So on to the NRC… but it’s not there. From that site, I got the name of the Project Manager for Prairie Island. CHAWLA, MAC L 301-415-8371 He called back and said it was reasonable to think that Xcel should make applications available… sigh… but he was too high on the food chain and to call Tommy Lee, 301-415-1458. Done.
OK, so now what… time to call in the big guns… OOPS, WHO DID I SEND THAT TO, NOW THEY’LL THINK I’M A TERRORIST AND I’LL NEVER GET THE DAMN THING… AAAAAAAAAAAGH, DELETE, DELETE, DELETE…
TO: Chris Clark and Mike Krikava:
WTF? Where’s the application?
XOXOXOXO,
CAO
… sigh…
==================
UPDATE: 3 minutes after emailing Chris & Mike:
I will see if I can get you one. I am out of town today so it may take an extra day
————————–
Christopher Clark
THANK YOU!!!
Poor Tom Micheletti, Exclesior Energy and IGCC…
April 16th, 2008
Somebody’s having another bad day… Tom Micheletti, Excelsior Energy, the Mesaba Project, IGCC, coal gasification, they’re all struggling, but put a muzzle on it, Tom — if you were my client, I’d fire you. Instead, I have to thank you for providing your opponents with such hilarious reparte.
Here it is, verbatim, can you believe this rant?
Anti-Range Power’ will stop at nothing
Editor:
I’m writing in response to your Monday, April 14 article about actions taken by the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) last week confirming that state law means what it plainly says. In particular, the quote in your news story from Margaret Hodnik representing Minnesota Power (more properly known as “Anti-Range Power”) warrants a response. Ms. Hodnik’s quote, that Anti-Range Power (MP) was just seeking “clarification,” is totally disingenuous, at best. For over a year they have strained mightily to read very easy and straightforward statutory language (just ask Senator Tomassoni, who wrote it), to somehow not mean what it says. The words are so clear that even a third grader could tell you what they mean. What makes matters even worse is that before signing a contract last summer to undertake transmission upgrades required under Federal law, they insisted that Excelsior seek confirmation from the PUC on or before May 1 of this year that the transmission exemption granted by the legislature applies. Excelsior has been trying since last August to get the PUC to issue such a confirmation, which they did last Thursday. Yet Anti-Range Power (MP) last week, rather than asking that the PUC issue the confirmation (that they required) as soon as possible, instead asked the PUC to delay consideration of the transmission exemption issue. Far from “seeking clarification” they were actively seeking yet more unnecessary delay, proving yet again that they will stop at nothing to prevent the Mesaba Project from proceeding. Once again, they are concealing their true actions and intentions, hoping that people on the Iron Range will believe that they are not doing everything in their power to kill the Mesaba Project. The next thing you know is that the Anti-Range power guys will appeal the PUC’s Order, again proving where their hearts really are when it comes to job creation and environmental protection on the Iron Range.
*
This is all so similar to what the Anti-Range company is trying to get people on the Range to believe about their current pollution control expenditures at Clay Boswell, Taconite Harbor, and Syl Laskin coal plants: That is, they want people to think that they are cleaning up their polluting smokestacks out of their own kindness, generosity, concern for the health of people on the Range, and concern for the environment. In fact, they were required by federal environmental authorities to undertake those measures. And further, the Anti-Range company also filed lawsuits and lobbied to prevent the imposition of those very clean air (CAIR) requirements. Isn’t it time for Iron Range newspapers to take these people on when they are speaking half truths or no-truths?Not since the building of the Clay Boswell plant in 1980 has any significant job-creating or environmental investment been made by that Duluth-based power company. If they truly cared about the Iron Range and its customers on the Iron Range, they would be helping us to get the Mesaba Project constructed as soon as possible. Instead, the new crop of anti-Range executives are doing exactly the opposite, with shareholder profits being the only thing that really matters to them, even if they say otherwise. All Range residents have to do is just look around to see what they have built in the last 25 years: essentially nothing. They spend more on Florida swampland than they do in our natural resource-filled lands. Perhaps it’s time for the legislature to revoke the Anti Range Power company’s monopoly service territory on the Iron Range, and give it to a company that won’t abuse such authority to the detriment of those for whom they are supposed to serve. Much higher electric and natural gas rates are on their way, no thanks to a company that seems to care less about its Iron Range bread and butter, and one that thinks that its effort to cover up its actions to do whatever it takes to prevent the Mesaba Project from becoming a reality is apparently not important, or is without consequences.
Thanks for the opportunity to comment.
Tom Micheletti
Co-President and CEO
Excelsior Energy Inc
… and what’s he ranting about? Here’s the original article:
By a 3-2 vote, the commission approved Excelsior’s request to exempt transmission infrastructure for the project from a certificate of need
Normally, utilities must convince the commission that there’s a need for a project they propose. But, under a 2003 law, the Mesaba Energy Project won’t require a certificate of need if it qualifies as an innovative energy project — and the commission has already ruled that it does.
The commission’s ruling Thursday extends the exemption from a certificate of need a step further — to the equipment that would transmit the power the Mesaba plant produces. Minnesota Power, rather than Excelsior, might have to build or own some of that transmission equipment.
The utilities commission, meeting in St. Paul, ruled against Excelsior on a second issue. The company’s chief executive called that issue the less important of the two, but the co-chair of a group that opposes the Mesaba project disagreed.
The adverse ruling dealt with a two-phase negotiating process that is supposed to fulfill a legislative mandate. The Legislature has said that, if Excelsior meets the innovative energy project standard, it is entitled to a power purchase agreement with Xcel Energy, a giant utility with more than 3 million customers in eight states.
Last August, the utilities commission declined to sign off on a first-phase agreement, which would have obliged Xcel to buy the 603-megawatt output of the first power production unit that Excelsior wants to build. Xcel filed an appeal, but the state Court of Appeals ruled it premature.
Phase two negotiations would be aimed at requiring Xcel to buy still more power from Excelsior. Excelsior had asked for an indefinite stay of that phase, but on Thursday the commission denied that request on a 5-0 vote.
“It went very well,” Excelsior CEO Tom Micheletti said of Thursday’s hearing in a telephone interview. He said the transmission issue was the more important of his company’s two petitions.
But Charlotte Neigh, co-chair of Citizens Against the Mesaba Project (CAMP), said the hangup on a power purchase agreement stymies Excelsior’s progress toward construction of a power plant near Taconite, the company’s preferred site.
Excelsior needs an agreement on power sales to Xcel “because that gives them a captive customer, which is what they absolutely must have,” Neigh said. She said she didn’t think “that winning the transmission thing was significant at all.”
Micheletti voiced disdain for Minnesota Power, which asked the commission to delay a decision on transmission infrastructure until final action on the power purchase agreement has been taken.
“They (Minnesota Power) are taking frivolous and unwarranted positions on state law,” Micheletti said. “I have a new name for them: ARP — anti-Range power.”
Excelsior Energy contended that the law regarding certificates of need and transmission infrastructure for an innovative energy project was very clear and the certificate was not needed. Margaret Hodnik, vice president of regulatory and legislative affairs for Minnesota Power, said her company held a different view.
“We feel it (state law) wasn’t clear enough,” Hodnik said. “We wanted clarification.”
Excelsior and Minnesota Power have an agreement about connecting the proposed coal gasification plant near Taconite to a sub-station near Blackberry that is owned by the power company.
Neigh said statements made by the commission chairman, LeRoy Koppendrayer, during Thursday’s meeting gave reason to believe he does not want the Mesaba project to go forward. A transcript of the meeting is not yet available.
The commission will hold further discussions later on power purchase negotiations.
Mike Jennings can be reached at mike.jennings@mx3.com. To read this story and comment on it online go to www.hibbingmn.com.
Here’s another from the Timberjay, note the last part where Bill Storm says he’s got to do some homework (DUH!):
Wednesday, April 16, 2008 Volume 19, Issue 14
Excelsior Energy seeking to delay power purchase ruling
By Marshall HelmbergerExcelsior Energy is asking the state’s Public Utilities Commission to put an indefinite hold on its request for consideration of a power purchase agreement, or PPA, for the second phase of its proposed coal gasification plant on the iron Range.
The PUC is set to hear Excelsior’s request at its April 10 meeting in St. Paul.
The company’s request for delay comes in the wake of last fall’s decision by the PUC to deny Excelsior’s request for a PPA with Xcel Energy on the first phase of its proposed Mesaba Energy project. The PUC, back in September, ordered Excelsior and Xcel, along with Minnesota Power, to continue negotiating over the terms of a PPA, but those talks have yet to produce a deal and no further action on the original PPA request is scheduled at this time.
Excelsior principal Tom Micheletti expressed optimism about the progress so far, but he expressed some frustration at the reluctance of the state’s utilities to accept the Mesaba Project and the coal gasification technology it entails. “The PPA is taking way too long,” he said. “It is unfortunate, that all the Minnesota utilities are not with us in helping to solve these problems, instead of just stonewalling the project and stonewalling the technology,” he said.
The lack of a PPA is key at this point, since all parties involved agree that without it, the project won’t move forward. Utilities like Xcel have argued they don’t need the power from the Mesaba plant and they say the technology can’t provide power at an affordable price in any case.
Janet Gonzalez, a staff analyst with the state’s PUC, said no one has a clear idea of the cost of power from the Mesaba plant at this point. She said preliminary cost estimates aren’t reliable since a number of factors haven’t been adequately defined. She acknowledged, however, that power produced by the plant will be more costly than from existing sources. “But that’s generally true with a new plant,” she said.
While Excelsior is seeking a delay on the second phase PPA at this point, Minnesota Power is asking the PUC to decide the matter now. According to Gonzalez, that’s because Minnesota Power wants to challenge a ruling made by the PUC last year, that determined that the Mesaba Project does qualify as an “Innovative Energy Project,” which gives it special regulatory exemptions under state law. Minnesota Power’s earlier attempt to challenge that decision was put on hold by the judge pending a decision on the second PPA.
Even as progress on a PPA appears at a standstill, Micheletti said Excelsior continues to move forward with siting and permitting work, although that process is facing challenges as well. The federal Environmental Protection Agency has raised some fundamental questions about the public purpose of the project, siting decisions, and other matters in a Jan. 11 letter sent in response to a draft environmental impact statement on the project. The EPA letter was just one of 122 comment letters which state officials will have to draft responses to before the EIS can be finalized. Bill Storm, who is overseeing the process for the PUC said some of the comment letters have raised issues that will likely prompt his team to do additional research instead of simply drafting responses to comments.