McGarity, Thomas O. (Author)
Harvard University Press
Physical Details: 540
Language: English
Pollution, Politics, and Power tells the story of the remarkable transformation of the electric power industry that has taken place over the last four decades. Electric power companies have morphed from polluting, regulated monopolies into cleaner deregulated generators, transmitters, and distributors of electrical power in a far more competitive economic environment. Companies are investing heavily in natural gas and utility-scale renewable resources, and they have quit building new coal-fired plants. The distribution side of the business has become a facilitator of end-use efficiency and a purchaser of excess electricity produced by rooftop solar panels and backyard wind turbines. Meanwhile, the once-powerful coal industry teeters on the edge of bankruptcy as electric power companies throughout the country shutter coal-fired power plants and reduced demand for coal causes mines to close throughout Appalachia and communities throughout the region suffer from high unemployment, reduced resources, and a spiraling opioid epidemic. Environmental regulation has played a major role in this transformation. The Environmental Protection Agency and its counterparts in the states have insisted that new power plants install the best available technology to control air pollution and that existing power plants limit their emissions and solid wastes. Market forces resulting from increased competition, increased supplies of natural gas and inexpensive wind and solar power have also played prominent roles. And the Trump administration's efforts to revive the coal industry by scaling back environmental controls and reregulating electricity prices have had little effect on the industry's decline. (Publisher)
...MoreReview William Boyd (January 2021) Review of "Pollution, politics, and power: The struggle for sustainable electricity". Technology and Culture (pp. 265-267).
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