;)
As greens steadily persuade governments to intervene more and more often in energy markets, the unintended consequences flow ever thicker and faster. In a delightful example today, we read that chemical companies are trying to deal with the steadily increasing price of energy by installing their own power generation facilities, burning ultra-dirty but dirt-cheap lignite.
For example, a power plant operated by Allessa Chemie using pulverized lignite recently entered service at Fechenheim east of Frankfurt, Germany. A similar facility will be completed next year by the WeylChem chemical company in nearby Griesheim. This plant will be capable of firing lignite, natural gas, or “white powder”, an inexpensive biomass substitute. Three truckloads of finely pulverized lignite per day will be supplied from the Rhineland about 200 km northwest near Cologne, with ash returned for mining reclamation.
And if you thought that green hurdles would be put in their way, you would be quite wrong:
An electronic capacity control limits both plants to 19.5 MW operation, alleviating the need to purchase EU Allowances (EUA) for emissions trading. Public hearings are also required only for capacities exceeding 50 MW, and environmental impact assessments per Directive 2014/52/EU above 300 MW.
Well done greens.