10.1 Introduction

The electrical generation industry is a vital element in the economic drive train. Until the last decades of the 20th century, the industry was marginally on the radar screen, as it was functioning as a regulated monopoly and with energy costs to customers that were usually tolerable, and controlled by Public Utility Commissions or Public Service Commissions. Several major developments impacted the status quo, and the effects are still far from settled. The more significant events contributing to the industry flux were the following:

• Environmental limitations of combustion emissions (particulates, SO ₂, NO _x and more recently mercury with CO ₂ somewhere near the horizon);

• Three Mile Island Unit #1 incident and later the Chernobyl disaster marking the curtailment of capital investment in the nuclear fuel option for the United States;

• The NO GO (in early 1970s) then GO with plentiful, inexpensive natural gas but now not so plentiful and definitely costly;

• The escalation of oil prices and trickle down effects to other fuels; and

• Deregulation of the electric power industry.

The industry situation today shows coal-fired generation as the backbone of the electric supply the coal being an essential resource as a reasonable cost, plentiful, domestically available fuel. The use of coal is also supplemented by other solid fuels (see Chapter 3): petroleum coke, wood waste, agricultural biomass, and a host of industrial products used in niche applications. If full...