Video Courtesy of KSL.com
"Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said his city would completely wean its 1.45 million electricity customers from coal-fired power by 2020"
The Intermountain Power Agency said Wednesday it will let the air-quality permit for a coal-fired Unit 3 expire. Instead, the company will focus on other options for the central Utah site, said IPA spokesman John Ward.
"The understanding within IPA is that if there were ever an attempt to start another third coal-fired power unit at that location, they would have to start over," he said. "This particular permit application would be moot."
Environmental groups, who have been fighting Unit 3 since it was first proposed, applauded the move.
The plant "would have burdened Utah with more coal-burning pollution," said Wayne Hoskinson, chairman of the Utah Chapter of the Sierra Club. "This opens the door for additional renewable projects, like the Milford wind development, allowing the state to still be an exporter of energy without the cost of worsened air quality and more mercury pollution."
The Sierra Club's appeal of the Unit 3 air permit has been on hold for more than a year, while IPA, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems were in court over a breach-of-contract suit over the new 900-megawatt generating station. That suit was settled quietly last month.
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