EXAMINING PLANNED U.S. POWER PLANT CAPACITY ADDITIONS IN THE CONTEXT OF CLIMATE CHANGE

摘要

This paper seeks to assess the degree to which the 471 planned fossil fueled power plants announced to be built within the next decade in the continental U.S. are amenable to significant carbon dioxide emissions mitigation via carbon dioxide capture and disposal in geologic reservoirs. In particular, we seek to assess the looming "carbon liability" (i.e., the potential 1 billion tons of annual CO_2 emissions) that these power plants represent for their owners and for the nation as the U.S. begins to address climate change. The combined generating capacity of these 471 planned plants is 320 GW. Less than half of these plants are located in the immediate vicinity of potentially suitable geologic carbon dioxide disposal reservoirs. The authors examine two hypothetical scenarios for how these plants will access known CO_2 disposal reservoirs.