Coal has always been both blessing and curse. For years it has offered us a potent, plentiful, and relatively cheap source of power. Today, it meets two-thirds of our electricity needs. But coal is also incredibly dirty, even with technologies to clean up the combustion process. When we burn coal we get Denver's infamous Brown Cloud, dangerous ground-level ozone, and airborne mercury, a potent neurotoxin.

Coal-powered generation is also our nation’s primary source of global warming pollution photo © Flickr/psd

The costs to public health are enormous – over 65,000 children in the Denver metro area alone suffer from asthma. With its harmful effects on cardiovascular health, metro-area coal plant pollution has been directly linked to adult mortality rates. If that weren’t enough, coal-powered generation is also our nation’s primary source of global warming pollution. Any serious effort to curb global warming over the next three decades must begin today with phasing out coal.

An important step forward in both cleaning up the air on Colorado’s Front Range and curbing our global warming pollution was passage of House Bill 1365, the Clean Air, Clean Jobs Act.

HB 1365 represents a new approach to doing just that.  It requires Colorado’s investor-owned utilities, including Xcel Energy, to propose a plan for phasing out or modifying at least 900 megawatts or half of their coal-fired generation (whichever is smaller). Behind the success of the 1365 effort are three key factors: 

• The coal plants in question are surprisingly old, with generating units dating back as far as the Eisenhower era. In calling for retirements or modifications, HB 1365 is merely accelerating a process that is already demanded by the old, dirty, and inefficient technology now in place.
  
  
• The Denver metro areas is out of compliance with Clean Air Act standards. With a clearer understanding of the real public health consequences of polluted air, the Environmental Protection Agency plans to further tighten ozone standards this summer. Colorado has little choice but to seek the bolder air pollution reductions enabled by HB 1365.
  
  
• Colorado has cleaner replacement resources ready to go. With the recent expansion of the state’s renewable energy standard to 30% by 2020, the second highest in the nation, old coal units can be replaced by renewable resources. Wind and solar power, energy efficiency programs, and natural gas will all be deployed to ensure that electricity is delivered reliably and cost-effectively to Colorado’s consumers.

The shift toward a clean energy economy is well underway, but it will not happen overnight. It will take us through several intermediate steps, not all of them ideal. Burning natural gas, for example, contributes roughly half as much global warming pollution as coal generation, but gas can only be a temporary transition fuel if we are to reach a zero-emission energy future. Moreover, the consequences of natural gas development cannot be ignored. Keeping landscapes intact and the air and water clean in gas patch communities is no less important than cleaning up the air on the Front Range. So as CEC pushes for full the implementation of HB 1365, we will also defend the recently updated rules governing the state's oil and gas development and continue our work to mitigate the impacts of natural gas drilling on public health and our environment.