West (By God) Virginia sits on top of legendary coal reserves.
It’s a rock ribbed Red State – keeping that woke clean energy out of there.
So why is Beautiful Clean Coal driving utility bills through the roof?
West Virginia Office of Energy:
Coal-fired power plants account for nearly all of West Virginia’s electricity generation, and 9 of the 10 largest power plants in the state, by capacity, are coal-fired. Most of the rest of the state’s electricity generation is from hydroelectric, wind, and natural gas-fired facilities. West Virginia is one of only a half-dozen states east of the Mississippi River that does not have any nuclear power plants.
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Looking at EIA data, Residential electricity for West Virginia is not hugely expensive – 14.77 cents/Kwh.
Here’s a clue:
” more than two-fifths of West Virginia households use electricity as their primary source for home heating, “. Electric resistance heating is famously inefficient and inexpensive, but still very common in areas of Appalachia and the south, where buildings typically are not built adequate insulation.
Also, from Virginia Public Radio, this:
As Virginia lawmakers push utilities to shift away from fossil fuels to renewable power by 2050, Appalachian Power customers still get a majority of their power from coal-fired power plants in West Virginia.
And while Virginia is trying to move away from coal, West Virginia wants to double down on the fossil fuel, leaving Appalachian Power torn between pleasing policymakers in both states – and sticking ratepayers with higher and higher bills.
One of West Virginia’s nine coal plants is the Harrison plant. Like the others, it supplies power to PJM Interconnection, the nation’s biggest grid operator which provides electricity to thirteen states and Washington D.C.. Harrison is West Virginia’s largest coal plant, in terms of electricity production. About 200 people work at the plant, which is located near Morgantown, close to the Pennsylvania line.
Standing outside the plant, Sierra Club volunteer Bill Price, who lives in nearby Upshur County, says his neighbors have concerns about how coal affects their power bills.
“They just want it to be less expensive than it is now,” Price says, “and this is just gonna keep us stuck with higher rates till the further duration of this plant.”
For a long time, coal was the cheapest source of electricity. But that’s changed, as fracking made gas more competitive, and solar dropped in price.
“It’s now true that it’s cheaper to build a new solar plant than it is to even run a coal fired power plant,” says William Shobe, economics professor emeritus at the University of Virginia.
Shobe says the longer it takes to transition from coal to gas and renewables, the more it will cost ratepayers.
Already, Virginia residential Appalachian Power customers have seen their bills increase 160% in the past decade. Many customers live in homes without enough insulation and can’t easily afford to buy new windows or doors. That also drives up their bills.
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But the Trump Administration keeps ordering aging coal plants to stay open across the country, a move that one local official has compared to “Soviet style central planning”.
In an unprecedented use of federal authority, President Donald Trump’s administration has invoked emergency powers to force a series of retiring coal plants to stay open.
Utilities, states and grid operators have said the aging plants are expensive, in bad repair and no longer needed to meet regional energy needs. But Trump’s efforts to save the dwindling coal industry have forced plant operators to continue investing in the facilities — a move that some consumer advocates fear could mean billions of dollars in added costs for customers in dozens of states.
Trump has long positioned himself as a champion of coal, making it a centerpiece of his “energy dominance” agenda. The emergency orders issued by his administration claim that the grid is at risk of energy shortfalls, and the coal plants are needed to ensure a reliable power supply.
But state officials in many places affected by the orders say that’s not true.
“Rather than allowing the realities on the ground, the regulators and the utilities to make rational decisions about how to meet energy needs, we have the Trump administration trying to do Soviet-style central planning to push an ideological agenda that will drive costs to customers,” said Will Toor, executive director of the Colorado Energy Office.
