Coal vs. other in Florida

So the governor of Florida says he thinks his state should look to sources of electricity other than coal.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — The future of coal as fuel for generating electricity in Florida is “not looking good,” Gov. Charlie Crist said Tuesday after the second setback in a month for utilities seeking to build new coal-fired plants.

A group that was planning to build a new coal plant in Taylor County, just southeast of Tallahassee, said Tuesday it was suspending its efforts to get a permit in the face of “growing concerns about greenhouse gas emissions.”

The decision, hailed by Crist as good for Florida, comes about a month after the state’s Public Service Commission rejected another coal power plant that Florida Power & Light, the state’s largest electric company, had wanted to build near the Everglades.

Crist said Florida is moving away from coal as a power source because burning it produces carbon dioxide emissions that are blamed for causing global warming. Crist spoke at a news conference in which he was promoting his meeting later this month in Miami with national leaders on dealing with global warming.

“We’re obviously moving in a different direction and I think we need to continue to explore solar, wind, nuclear, other alternatives that are clean emission,” Crist said. “Continuing to rely on foreign oil and coal, I don’t think, is in the best interest of our state.”

Electric and coal industry officials have tried to make the case in recent years that burning the fuel is a much cleaner enterprise than it was a few decades ago. It is much cheaper and its prices less volatile than natural gas, which allows utilities to sell electricity at lower rates. Building a coal plant is also cheaper than building nuclear plants. ...

Last month, the Public Service Commission rejected an FPL proposal to build what would have been the nation’s largest new coal-burning power plant in Glades County — although commissioners ruled on economic grounds not direct concerns about climate change. The potential cost of regulations on carbon emissions, however, was a factor in the decision.

Coal industry officials say the technology must be considered part of the mix because of economics. A recent report from the industry-backed Americans for Balanced Energy Choices pointed out that most American families pay 20 percent of their after-tax income on energy — and that coal is the only fuel that has maintained a stable price over the last decade.

“Our elected officials need to be very careful as they start crafting potential climate change legislation that they don’t inadvertently seriously hurt the Americans most susceptible to increased energy costs because of overly ambitious programs,” group executive director Joe Lucas said in a recent analysis of energy costs.

Okay, coal is bad. So what's better? What can meet Florida's energy needs in the foreseeable future? Natural gas, maybe, but the price can be volatile. Nuclear is out. Solar is out. And I have no idea how much it would cost Florida to import hydropower from the TVA, assuming it even could.

If you think West Virginia is in league with the devil regarding coal, what about states that don't have their own sources of energy but are growing nonetheless. Aren't they in the same boat?

Conservation will carry you only so far if you expect to maintain the same standard of living, right? It's either cut back or burn coal. Not good options, but we have to face this reality sometime.