Natural Gas or Renewables? New Orleans Choice Is Shadowed by Katrina

On a reporter’s recent visit to City Hall, one councilwoman declined to discuss the gas plant, citing pending litigation, while aides to the six other council members were unresponsive to requests for comment.

Shifting Economics

Until the recession a decade ago, coal-fired power plants generated almost half of all electricity in the country. But power from natural-gas plants surged as fracking produced an abundant supply of the fuel.

At the end of 2018, about a third of the nation’s electricity was coming from natural gas and a little more than a quarter from coal. Renewable sources like wind, solar and hydroelectric plants produced 18 percent of the electricity and nuclear 19 percent, according to data from the federal Energy Information Administration.

Along the way, Entergy put forward its New Orleans proposal. But critics argue that the economics have changed since then, and that solar power, combined with energy storage, offers competitive prices. They say that is especially true of a plant like the New Orleans project, aimed at periods of peak demand, which might require it to operate only 20 percent of the year or less.

In a September report, the Rocky Mountain Institute, a nonprofit environmental research organization, said the utility industry was set to spend $70 billion on development of natural-gas power plants through the mid-2020s, while pouring money into electricity production from clean energy would save $29 billion and reduce carbon emissions by 100 million tons a year.

Neal Kirby, an Entergy spokesman, said as the need for the power plant became apparent, a gas facility was the best option. He said renewable-energy plants had become less expensive than some projects but added, “That wasn’t the case a few years ago.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/business/energy-environment/gas-power-plants.html?emc=rss&partner=rss