Fresh Loaf

Lobbbyist parties held by Southern Co. for “the Southern delegation” sound like they’re just a step up from fraternity band parties.

Case in point: According to CQPolitics, Atlanta-based utility giant Southern Co. co-sponsored a private party last Sunday in honor of our distinguished gentlemen that featured Sammy Hagar, world-famous curly-haired rocker and tequila enthusiast .

From the article (bold text added to imply outrage and disgust):

For example, the rules weren’t necessarily as tough for the Southern Company sponsoring a Sammy Hagar concert Sunday at the venue First Avenue, billed as a tribute to the Southern Delegation.

Posters and television screens reminded guests of numerous sponsors, including “partners” the National Association of Home Builders and Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of America, and “additional sponsors” such as Aflac, Wal-Mart and Lockheed Martin.

The message might have been lost on giggling women spilling out of limousines ahead of men with their collars loosened and ready to rock and roll.

But the doormen studiously lined up congressional aides and other guests with convention credentials, for tickets priced at $75 or $125. The House ethics committee had ruled that, depending on a performer’s fame, staffers should pay for tickets to avoid receiving a gift of free entertainment.

“Southern Company co-hosted this event along with many others,” said spokeswoman Valerie Holpp. “We fully complied with rules.”

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Rob Pavey at the Augusta Chronicle reports the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have determined two new nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle would not have an impact on the environment. The commission approved an early site permit initially requested by Southern Co., the plant’s co-owner and operator, in August 2006.

From the article:

The early site permitting process allows an applicant to address site-related issues, such as environmental impacts, for possible construction and operation of a nuclear power plant.

Although it is not a license to build reactors, it streamlines the process to determine whether a proposed site is suitable.

(Photo courtesy of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission)

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The cost of building nuclear reactors, such as the two new ones Southern Co. has proposed at Plant Vogtle near Waynesboro, is high. Turns out storing the spent fuel generated from the power generators at Yucca Mountain in Nevada will be expensive as well.

From E&E News (subscription required):

DOE has spent $13.5 billion since 1983, and figures to spend $54.8 billion on construction, operation and decommissioning of the [Yucca Mountain] repository; $19.5 billion for transporting the waste — including building the canisters for holding waste; and $8.4 billion for other program activities.

The report notes that the expenses were based on a repository opening date of 2017 — a best possible opening date that Sproat has already said is no longer possible due to budget constraints, which have pushed it to 2020. The lifecycle estimate also does not include the at least $11 billion in liability expenses DOE expects for breaking its contract with utilities to begin taking away the spent nuclear fuel in 1998.

Another possible cost increase could come from the more than 30 planned new nuclear reactors, which were not included in the estimate. Sproat said trying to estimate costs for waste from the new reactors would be speculative and would no longer provide “an apples to apples” comparison with the 2001 report….

(Hat tip to the always informative Joe Romm at ClimateProgress)

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It takes money to make money. And when you’re Atlanta-based carbon king Southern Co., it takes even more money to maintain the status quo.

The ever entertaining and informative Joe Romm at ClimateProgress passes on news of the hometown mom-and-pop business.

The nation’s energy bill is now about a trillion dollars. That means the super-rich fossil fuel companies have enormous profits they can spend on lobbying to ensure their continued dominance. How much? Jeff Goodell has the answer here:

…

The 800-pound gorilla in coal politics has long been The Southern Company, the big Atlanta-based coal-burning electric utility.

Once again, Southern didn’t disappoint its friends, doling out $2.8 million in lobbying expenses in Q1 of 2008. That’s close to surpassing the All-Time Lobbying Champion of the Fossil Fuel Industry, ExxonMobil, which spent $3 million in the same period.

Last year, the company spent $14 million on handshakes and head nods in Washington, D.C.

UPDATE: Forgot to even mention this. Romm also points out that the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity — a King Coal front group  — spent $1.9 million in the first quarter. The Solar Energies Industries Association, in comparison, spent $75,000.

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Plant Hatch, a nuclear power plant primarily owned by Atlanta-based Southern Co., was forced into an emergency shutdown for 48 hours in early March because a software update rattled the system, the Washington Post reported yesterday.

From the article:

The incident occurred on March 7 at Unit 2 of the Hatch nuclear power plant near Baxley, Georgia. The trouble started after an engineer from Southern Company, which manages the technology operations for the plant, installed a software update on a computer operating on the plant’s business network.

…

Weiss said unplanned, automatic shutdowns such as what happened at the Hatch plant are costly, forcing utilities to purchase power from other parts of the grid to the tune of about $1 million a day. But more importantly, Weiss said, automatic shutdowns unnecessarily challenge nuclear safety systems.

…

News of the Hatch incident also comes as the cyber-security posture of the electric and nuclear power industry is coming under increasing scrutiny from Congress and government investigators. Last month, the Government Accountability Office issued a scathing report about cyber security weaknesses at the Tennessee Valley Authority, the nation’s largest public power company and operator of three nuclear plants, including Browns Ferry.

…

“To people in the IT world, cyber means ‘attacks,’ but what I tell people is that in our world the predominant cyber events are unintentional,” he said. “The flip side of that is if it can happen unintentionally, it can probably be caused intentionally and be a whole lot worse.”

The article’s long, but it’s a great read that shows technology redundancies at power plants may be just as much a threat to their security as a terrorist attack.

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The Rome News-Tribune is reporting that 30 years after Georgia Power’s Plant Bowen started belching out pollutants, one of the nation’s biggest carbon dioxide emitters has installed its first of four scrubbers at the facility.

The device — known as a flue gas desulphurization system — is estimated to remove 95 percent of sulfur dioxide from emissions. Its lone waste product — gypsum — will be sold to an Alabama rock wall company.

The article says that Georgia Power plans on installing 21 scrubbers on six of its coal-fired power plants. Each one will take three years to construct.

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Cost of one ton of Appalachian coal in 2007: $40

Cost of one ton of Appalachian coal in 2008: $90

Percentage of electricity price increase Georgia Power recently requested from the state Public Services Commission: 3

Number of times Georgia Power has requested rate increases during the past five years: 5

Amount Georgia Power parent company, Southern Co., spent on government lobbying in 2007: $14.5 million

Number of new coal plants planned for Georgia: 2 Amount of energy, in megawatts, the two coal power plants can produce: 2,050

Amount of energy, in megawatts, that one wind turbine among many located off the Georgia coast could generate in clean energy: 160

Sources: Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Augusta Chronicle, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Public Service Commission, Georgia Tech Strategic Energy Institute, OpenSecrets.org

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Woe is Georgia Power.

The energy heavy and subsidiary of Atlanta-based Southern Co. is advocating before the Public Services Commission today and tomorrow that it needs to raise its rates 3 percent because of the skyrocketing cost of natural gas and coal, the state’s predominant fuel burned to generate electricity. Customers would most likely see their bills go up $3 if the hike is approved.

Georgia Power says the rate hike will generate $222 million. Long the cheapest bang-for-the-buck source, coal’s prices have risen sharply, from nearly $40 a ton early last year to $90 a ton in today’s market, thanks to increasing demand from India and China. Two new coal power plants have been proposed for the state of Georgia. The mining and use of coal is also probably one of the stiffest middle fingers you can give to Mother Nature, but that’s another story.

In other news, the sun continues to shine and wind continues to blow.

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NCAA CHAMPIONSHIP: Memphis crumbles, Mario Chalmers hits the shot of his life and Kansas wins in OT.

GRADY EXPECTATIONS: Robert M. Woodruff Foundation gives $200 million cash donation to the ailing hospital to keep it afloat as power is transferred.

THE LONGEST YARD: Michael Vick initiates mail correspondence with Arthur Blank, telling the Falcons owner he’s playing football in prison and washing pots and pans for 12 cents an hour.

FLIPPING A BIRD? Unnamed active Falcons player is subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury in NFL performance-enhancing drug investigation.

SPRING BREAK! Despite having made almost no progress in the quest to meet SACS’s nine accreditation-hinging mandates, Clayton County Schools administration is taking its scheduled five days off for spring break like everyone else in the school system. Meanwhile, the interim superintendent pleads for leniency.

IT TOLLS FOR FEE: I-85 OTP could be getting optional toll lanes to ease traffic congestion, possibly as far north as I-985.

STONY BURKE: Lobbyist with vaguely subdivisionesque name is tapped as Southern Co.’s new “director of federal legislative meddling affairs.”

LAKE LANIER: Will be the site of Canadian Olympic trials next month, presumably for its mud-racing team.

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While leaders and scientists debate the pros and cons of setting long-term goals to lower carbon dioxide emissions, the greenhouse gas responsible for global warming continues to rise. According to the Environmental Integrity Project, a nonprofit environmental group, carbon dioxide emissions from U.S. power plants climbed 2.9 percent in 2007, the biggest single-year increase since 1998. The electric power industry’s carbon dioxide emissions have risen 5.9 percent since 2002 and 11.7 percent since 1997, the group says. Carbon dioxide emissions from power generation are predicted by the U.S. Department of Energy to increase 19 percent between now and 2030. The EIP used data from the Environmental Protection Agency to compile its findings.

In Georgia, the report says, CO2 emissions from power plants have risen 20 percent, or by 16.8 million tons, in the last five years, second to Texas. Last year, the Southern Co.-owned Plant Scherer outside Macon emitted 27.2 million tons of CO2 in 2007, up roughly 2 million tons since 2006. The facility is the country’s foulest coal-fired power plant.

From the report, here’s where Georgia ranks:

• The top 10 states that emitted the most CO2 in 2007 (measured in total tons) are: Texas, Ohio, Florida, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, and West Virginia.

• The top 10 states with the largest increases in CO2 emissions over the last five years (between 2002 and 2007) are: Texas, Georgia, Arizona, Pennsylvania, California, Illinois, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, and North Carolina.

• The top 10 states with the largest increases over the past ten years between 1997 and 2007) are Texas, Arizona, Georgia, California, Illinois, Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, Oklahoma, and Missouri.

So, what can we do?

The EIP recommends the nation’s oldest coal-fired power plants, some of which were constructed 50 years ago, need to be retired and replaced with cleaner sources of energy, such as wind and solar power. Problem (from my point of view): A 2007 study by Georgia Power and Georgia Tech concluded that wind power could be generated along the state’s coast, but the capital costs associated with the technology are expensive.

Second, the EIP says that we have to start constructing more energy-efficient buildings. Since the study pegs utilities as the biggest contributor to carbon dioxide emissions, if we lessen our demand, we’ll lighten the load on energy the plants have to produce. Problem (again, from my point of view): Energy-efficient homes, while becoming more affordable, are still not affordable to everyone. Especially the segments of the population who face the most severe burden from high energy bills.

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Business magazine Portfolio has blessed Atlanta-based Southern Co. with a coveted spot on its list of top 10 corporate polluters. The parent company of Georgia Power is described by the glossy as such:

Southern provides power to more than 4 million customers, but its plants emit a mass of noxious gases across the southern United States. Analyzing E.P.A. data, the Environmental Integrity Project reports that Southern runs six of the 50 dirtiest power plants in the country in terms of sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and mercury released. Its Bowen plant in Georgia, run by subsidiary Georgia Power, is the biggest American sulfur-dioxide polluter. Southern owns the top three carbon-dioxide-emitting plants in the U.S., two of which rank second and third in mercury output as well. And five of its other plants are among the country’s top 50 nitrogen-oxide producers.

What the company says: Southern continues to invest billions of dollars to lower its chemical and greenhouse-gas emissions while also seeking out new ways to produce cleaner energy.

Way to go, Southern Co.! All publicity’s good publicity!

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Amount Coca-Cola Co. paid former CEO Neville Isdell in 2007: $31.9 million

Amount Coca-Cola paid current CEO Muhtar Kent in 2007: $8.7 million

Average salary of an account manager (sales) at Coca-Cola: $38,327

Amount Home Depot paid former CEO Robert Nardelli in 2006: $13.1 million

Value of Nardelli’s Home Depot severance package: $210 million

People Home Depot laid off from its Vinings headquarters in January: 500

Amount Southern Co. paid CEO David Ratcliffe in 2006: $7.8 million

Annual salary for “utility worker” position advertised on Southern Co.’s website: $24,696

Sources: Atlanta Journal-Constitution, PayScale, Executive PayWatch Database, CFO magazine, Fortune magazine, Athens Banner-Herald, New York Times

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It’s a wallet, you perverts!

The Associated Press reports that Atlanta-based Southern Co., parent company of Georgia Power, Alabama Power, God-We-Have-So-Much Power, and other utilities, spent more than $14 million last year on lobbying the U.S. Congress, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Energy Department and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

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Statistics released yesterday show that Georgia is home to the nation’s dirtiest power plant, Monroe County’s Plant Scherer. We’ve also got No. 3, Plant Bowen in Bartow County.

The nation’s second-dirtiest power plant is right next door, in Alabama. And all three are operated by Southern Co.

According to one estimate, the nation’s 50 dirtiest power plants account for only 14 percent of our electricity-generating facilities, yet are responsible for 40 percent of the nation’s power-plant pollution.

Perhaps I have Southern Co.’s political influence to thank for my persistent summer cough. Those green