As part of his "Green New Deal" plan, Democratic presidential primary candidate Bernie Sanders wants the Tennessee Valley Authority to shut down all its fossil fuel-burning plants and generate electricity solely from renewable sources. TVA currently operates six coal-fired power plants, 17 natural gas plants, and one diesel generator site. The rest of its power comes from nuclear, hydroelectric, solar, wind and biogas.
That may seem fanciful, but two writers say in The New York Times that it's not a bad idea for TVA focus on clean energy generation. Justin Gillis is a former Times environmental reporter; Jameson McBride is an energy analyst at the Breakthrough Institute, an environmental research center.
TVA, which sells power across parts of seven states, has a history of polluting waterways and property by improperly storing the toxic coal ash generated by its coal-fired power plants, they write: "In December 2008, an immense spill of coal ash at a TVA plant in Kingston, Tenn., polluted a nearby river and caused millions of dollars of property damage. The TVA had failed to carry out elementary safety measures, and the lead cleanup contractor was found negligent in court. Many workers on the cleanup have fallen ill and close to 40 have died; how much responsibility the contractor bears for the deaths is still being contested in court."
Though TVA is moving away from coal, and generates the lion's share of its electricity from nuclear power, Gillis and McBride write that the federal utility is moving too slowly to build more wind and solar generators. The modest solar buildout the agency's has adopted will result in higher electric bills for TVA customers than those who buy from other producers, they believe.
The biggest problem is that TVA has no central boss to drive change; just board members appointed by the president. "So the agency, long dominated by a conservative engineering mind-set, has gotten little pressure from Washington to move faster on the energy transition. But it is starting to get pressure from the other direction: cities that buy power wholesale and resell it to their citizens. Memphis, for instance, is considering pulling out of the TVA system and cutting its own deals for clean power," Gillis and McBride write.
TVA already has some of the lowest emissions in the country, but it could achieve much more in short order if it wanted to, they write: "The backwardness of the TVA on this issue is not just a national embarrassment; it is a betrayal of the agency’s own progressive legacy as one of the signature creations of the New Deal. The next president, whether Mr. Sanders or somebody else, needs to shake up the TVA board and demand that the agency become a leader, not a laggard, in battling the climate crisis."
That may seem fanciful, but two writers say in The New York Times that it's not a bad idea for TVA focus on clean energy generation. Justin Gillis is a former Times environmental reporter; Jameson McBride is an energy analyst at the Breakthrough Institute, an environmental research center.
TVA, which sells power across parts of seven states, has a history of polluting waterways and property by improperly storing the toxic coal ash generated by its coal-fired power plants, they write: "In December 2008, an immense spill of coal ash at a TVA plant in Kingston, Tenn., polluted a nearby river and caused millions of dollars of property damage. The TVA had failed to carry out elementary safety measures, and the lead cleanup contractor was found negligent in court. Many workers on the cleanup have fallen ill and close to 40 have died; how much responsibility the contractor bears for the deaths is still being contested in court."
Though TVA is moving away from coal, and generates the lion's share of its electricity from nuclear power, Gillis and McBride write that the federal utility is moving too slowly to build more wind and solar generators. The modest solar buildout the agency's has adopted will result in higher electric bills for TVA customers than those who buy from other producers, they believe.
The biggest problem is that TVA has no central boss to drive change; just board members appointed by the president. "So the agency, long dominated by a conservative engineering mind-set, has gotten little pressure from Washington to move faster on the energy transition. But it is starting to get pressure from the other direction: cities that buy power wholesale and resell it to their citizens. Memphis, for instance, is considering pulling out of the TVA system and cutting its own deals for clean power," Gillis and McBride write.
TVA already has some of the lowest emissions in the country, but it could achieve much more in short order if it wanted to, they write: "The backwardness of the TVA on this issue is not just a national embarrassment; it is a betrayal of the agency’s own progressive legacy as one of the signature creations of the New Deal. The next president, whether Mr. Sanders or somebody else, needs to shake up the TVA board and demand that the agency become a leader, not a laggard, in battling the climate crisis."
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