U.S. Senate candidate defends coal-generated power

May 22 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Michelle Wolford and David Beard The Dominion Post, Morgantown, W.Va.

Flanked by piles of tires and with the Albright Power Plant behind him, U.S. Senate-hopeful John Raese attacked President Barack Obama, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Lisa Jackson and his rival -- Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va. -- for creating "a complex set of standards designed to make coal generated power obsolete.

"That's unacceptable," Raese said at a Monday morning press conference. This was the opening salvo in Raese's attempt to unseat Manchin for a full six-year Senate term. Republican Raese narrowly lost to Manchin in a 2010 special election to fill the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd's unexpired term. Raese lost by 53,345 votes out of a total 529,948 votes cast.

Raese likens Manchin's 2009 HB 103 -- which calls for up to 25 percent of the power generated in West Virginia to come from alternative and renewable sources by 2025 -- to a West Virginia cap and trade bill. Alternative energy ranges from wind to burning used tires, Raese said.

"Really, Joe? Used tires?" he asked.

The Albright Power Station is scheduled to close in September. Mon Power and its parent company FirstEnergy announced their plan to close the Albright, Willow Island and Rivesville plants just two weeks after announcing the planned closure of six other plants in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland. The company cited the EPA's New Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS), set to take effect in 2015, as the reason for the plant shutdowns.

"The Obama/Manchin/ Jackson EPA is providing a moving target for energy producers," Raese said.

For instance, he said, FirstEnergy spent five years and $1.8 billion upgrading and retrofitting the W.H. Stammis Power Station just across the Ohio River from New Cumberland. "After all of that work and expense, the company is still not sure whether they can comply with this new set of rules recently issued by Barack Obama, Lisa Jackson and the Environmental Protection Agency."

Raese said that Obama and the EPA "think that putting incredible pressure on the coal industry will somehow force more rapid development and deployment of alternative energy sources."

He noted that coal will continue to be a major source of electrical energy well into the future, but the Obama administration has again cut the amount of research dollars allocated to clean coal technology. That causes pain -- suffered not by the companies but by the workers, their families and communities.

New EPA regulations "will cost electric utilities $184 billion, cost our fragile economy 1.4 million American jobs and will bring us, the consumer, rate increases estimated between 11 and 23 percent to our monthly power bill," Raese said. "In certain coal dominant states, like West Virginia, that number could be even higher."

In Preston County, 61 workers will be displaced by the closing of the Albright Plant, "the tax base used to fund education in the county will be reduced by $400,000 and the Preston County Commission will lose $180,000 from their budget each year," he said, likening the administration's tactics to "trickle-up misery."

"I am here in Albright today to stand side by side with the coal producers, the coal miners and the coal users in this great state," Raese said. "We need someone new in the White House, someone new at the EPA, someone new at the Department of Energy and a new senator from West Virginia. That is change we can believe in and that is the only change that makes sense to save West Virginia's coal industry."

Manchin responds

Manchin's campaign spokeswoman Fiona Conroy issued this statement in response to Raese's comments:

"On his first day in office, Sen. Manchin did exactly what he promised: He stopped the [federal] cap-and-trade bill. Every day since then, he's been standing up for West Virginia coal and our way of life. Sen. Manchin is determined to bring Democrats and Republicans together to develop a comprehensive energy plan and protect our good jobs. In West Virginia, he proved that it could be done, working with business and labor."

The campaign supplied highlights of Manchin's energy agenda, which includes the EPA Fair Play act, to stop the EPA from retroactively vetoing mine permits; the American Alternative Fuels Act to allow the government to use more domestic fuels, such as coal-to-liquids; the REINS Act to require Congressional approval for any agency regulation that could cost the economy $100 million or more; and the Keystone XL Pipeline to transport Canadian oil across the U.S.

Manchin also refuted several of Raese's claims. He said the West Virginia Coal Association and the state Chamber of Commerce supported HB 103. And HB 103's goals are achievable using West Virginia coal and natural gas.

Manchin noted that the now-dead federal cap and trade set emissions standards, and didn't include clean coal as an energy source.

"The fact is," Conroy said, "the people of West Virginia know that Sen. Manchin has earned his strong support from a broad coalition -- including Democrats, Independents and Republicans, as well as business and labor -- exactly because of his bipartisan approach to energy independence."

JOHN RAESE AND DAVID RAESE

co-own the West Virginia Newspaper

Publishing Co., publisher of The Dominion Post. The Raese brothers also coown the West Virginia Radio Corp. and Greer Industries Inc.