Dive Brief:
- Environmental advocates continue to press Minnesota Power to integrate more renewable resources into the utility's 15-year plan, arguing that it should be able to achieve more than 33% carbon-free power in that time.
- While advocates have been careful to also laud the company for its gradual move away from coal generation, a Sierra Club official told the Minnesota Daily, "we believe there is opportunity to push that a lot further.”
- The utility has proposed moving from about 75% coal generation to a more diverse power mix with less coal and more natural gas and renewables. Critics, however, have focused on the lack of any new wind generation in the plan.
Dive Insight:
The comment period in front of regulators has closed, but environmental advocates continue to make their case that Minnesota Power can do more to move away from fossil fuel generation.
“I will give Minnesota Power credit; they have invested in wind and solar energy and worked with customers to become more energy efficient,” Jessica Tritsch, senior organizing representative of the Sierra Club, told Minnesota Daily. “But we believe there is opportunity to push that a lot further.”
The utility's forward-looking 15-year plan which it estimates will cut emissions 30% by 2025, however, contains no new wind generation, a point which environmentalists have seized on to highlight where they believe more progress can be made.
Lucinda West, a freshman at University of Minnesota Duluth and task force leader of the Minnesota Public Interest Research Group Duluth chapter, said “everyone was shocked when they heard that Minnesota Power wasn’t planning on adding any more wind power in the next 15 years.”
Minnesota Power is making progress, and the utility points out that its generation mix was once almost entirely coal. "Each year, our customers are served by electricity which comes from a more diverse set of clean power sources, and we are meeting our goals in a way that protects our customers, the communities we serve and the quality of life in our region," ALLETE Chairman, President and CEO Alan Hodnik pointed out last year.
But currently, Minnesota gets about 44% of its power from coal while Minnesota Power is using 75%.
“We believe that the best energy mix is a balanced energy mix with not too much renewable energy or coal,” Minnesota Power spokeswoman Amy Rutledge told the newspaper.
More than 1,500 state residents submitted comments to regulators, urging greater investment in renewable energy.
