What A Bio-Mess

Austin Energy customers still deserve answers on biomass plant.

What to Know: Even the Austin American-Statesman is calling the city of Austin’s plan to buy a biomass electrical generation plant “bungled.”

“We welcome anything Austin can do to reduce the losses from this bungled foray into biomass power generation, though buying the troubled plant is a bitter pill to swallow,” a new Statesman editorial reads. “Once the sale paperwork is finalized, Austin Energy’s ratepayers — the ones who shouldered the cost of this debacle — deserve to see the terms of the 2008 contract and how the sunny projections fell short of energy market realities.”

The TPPF Take: The plan to purchase biomass energy (to make up for unreliable wind and solar energy) was ill-conceived from the start.

“This is the irony that renewable energy mandates reveal,” says TPPF’s Chuck DeVore. “To ‘decarbonize’ while maintaining a reliable electric grid, the city of Austin turned to biomass, a form of energy that dirtier, less efficient and more expensive than the obvious alternative, natural gas. No wonder the city isn’t eager to share the details of the deal.”

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