Utah Takes a Huge Step Forward on Climate Change

   Perhaps it took the prompting of President Joe Biden to help reach the decision, but Utah just took a huge step towards meeting the world's climate change standards.

   Big step.

   Read this whole thing and we'll tell you how Bill Gates plays into it. But, first, let's start with Friday's breaking news. PacifiCorp, the parent company of Rocky Mountain Power, let it be known it will hasten the closure of its coal-fired power plants -- it will shutter them. Yes, the deadly coal plant -- producing more greenhouse gas emissions than any other single source. Yes, the dreaded coal-fired plant, which at one time emitted 50 percent of the mercury that filters into our air -- and 75 percent of the acid gas. 

  Before the announcement, PacifiCorp had planned on running the Huntington plant right up to 2036, and the Hunter plant all the way to 2042. Those closures wouldn't have jived with the Paris Agreement's goals of cutting carbon emissions 50 percent by 2030 and reaching net zero in emissions by 2050.

   When you've got the whole world to rely upon, how do you get everyone on board? What if Utah had opted not to do its part? This state is just a small part of the pie when it comes to global greenhouse emissions, right? So, maybe Utah could just slack off and everything would be fine, right? 

   Well, along came Joe Biden and that Inflation Reduction Act, offering $27 billion to willing clean energy and climate projects. Now, perhaps the state was planning all along to move up the retirement dates for its coal-fired plants. But, if Utah was fudging about doing it's part, that changed. You might fudge on doing your share without some enticement, but slap the enticements down and -- in order to get your fare share of them -- you suddenly jump on board. Money changes everything. 

   "Of course," said Gregory Todd, director of the Utah Office of Energy Development, "this conversation is happening in part because of the extreme agenda of the Biden administration's (Environmental Protection Agency). 

   So, that plant in Huntington that wasn't to close until 2036? And the one in Hunter that was to stick around all the way to 2042? Now they are both set to come offline in 2032. And, in the mean time, PacifiCorp plans to tamp down on the emissions from the power system it has serving six states, slashing greenhouse gas emissions by 70 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2050.

   Now we're inline with the Paris Accords' standards.

  Of course, PacifiCorp is going to have to replace that power with some other form of energy. PacifiCorp expects to increase its wind and solar energy fourfold by 2032. Nuclear power? Small nuke plants will be born in place of the retiring coal plants. 

   And, that's where Bill Gates comes in. In 2021, Gates and PacifiCorp announced plans to build the TerraPower nuclear plant in Kemmerer, Wyoming. Since the Kemmerer plant is further along than the ones to be built in Huntington and Hunter, PacifiCorp will be watching it as it begins bringing the Utah plants online. Plus, the plants will share the same grid. So, Gates becomes involved in the grid serving Utah.

(Index -- Climate change info)