Thank you for your response. While 1-1/2% per year seems like very little, at least it appears to be progress. I hope it is adequate. I’d sure like to see a much more aggressive program. As for the unilateral arguement, it sounds l ike my two little kids squabbling so I’ll respond in my accustomed fashion: someone needs to start, to set an example, to do the right thing, to stop making absurd excuses. Comparing a Kansas or American family, with their typical energy/waste/consumption/money budget, with a typical family in any other country would likely indicate that we have a vastly greater room for improvement. If we apply the monies now spent on trying to steal foreign oil to technology dedicated to avoiding the need for it, we might see the weather improve in our lifetimes, not to mention an enormous bounty of other benefits.

Sincerely,
Michael Slavin

Correspondence_Reply@roberts.senate.gov wrote:

May 29, 2008

Dear Mr. Slavin:

Thank you for writing regarding climate change. I appreciate your thoughts on this issue.

In October, Senator Joseph Lieberman (ID-CT) introduced S. 2191, America’s Climate Security Act. This legislation reduces greenhouse gas emission by 18 percent to 25 percent in 2020 and 62 percent to 66 percent in 2050 through a cap-and-trade program. The bill covers emissions from transportation, electric power, manufacturing and natural gas sources. S. 2191 was referred to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) where Chairwoman Barbara Boxer held several hearings. S. 2191 was approved by the EPW Committee and awaits further consideration by the Senate.

While global warming is a complex and controversial issue, there remains uncertainties concerning the cause and the effect of climate change. It is difficult to address national and international environmental issues and policies because of the lines built up by proponents and opponents of climate change. Compromise on both sides of the issue will certainly be key.

I do not believe it is in the United States best interest to unilaterally undertake mandatory carbon dioxide emission reductions until other nations agree to do the same. Any unilateral U.S. reductions in greenhouse gas emission will simply be offset by China and India, thereby not improving the global environment at all.

Kansas plays an important role in climate change policies because farms and ranches naturally absorb carbon dioxide. In the past, I have introduced major legislation that encourages the “banking” of carbon by agriculture. This process, known as carbon sequestration, has been estimated to absorb the equivalent of all manmade carbon dioxide emissions emitted annually by the United States. Realizing Kansas’ unique role in providing a climate change solution, I successfully convinced my Senate colleagues to fund climate change research in this area for Kansas State University and the University of Kansas. As Congress continues to review climate change legislation, I will continue to keep your counsel in mind on this issue.

Again thank you for taking the time to contact me. If you would like more information on issues before the Senate, please visit my website at http://roberts.senate.gov. You may also sign up on my home page for a monthly electronic newsletter that will provide additional updates on my work for Kansas.

With every best wish,

Sincerely,

Pat Roberts

UK: May 1, 2008

LONDON - Rich countries must commit to cutting carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050 and developing nations must agree that by 2020 they too will set their own targets, leading economist Nicholas Stern said on Wednesday.

by Greg Pahl, Vermont Biofuels Association, Co-Founder

We have the necessary resources to meet most of our energy needs in the future with renewable energy. Until fairly recently one key strategy has, for the most part, been overlooked in North America. This innovative strategy involves the cooperative and collaborative installation and ownership of advanced renewable energy projects at the local, community level.

CSE projects are somewhat similar to Community Supported Agriculture (CSA). The main difference, however, is that instead of investing in potatoes, carrots, or cucumbers, with CSE, local residents invest in energy projects that provide greater energy security and a wide variety of other benefits.

When applied to wind power for example, this strategy falls in between the large-scale commercial wind farm and the small-scale residential wind turbine, and has been described as “The Third Way.” This middle strategy, also referred to as Community Supported Wind, relies on somewhat smaller scale projects that are developed, sited and owned by members of the local community rather than out-of-state corporate entities.

Community Supported Wind could fill a huge gap in the present wind power sector. And this approach is not limited to wind power, but can be applied to virtually any type of local renewable energy project such as solar thermal or photovoltaic panels, biogas digesters, a variety of biofuels production facilities, geothermal or geoelectric projects, and small-scale hydro.

When applied to a wide variety of renewable energy technologies, this strategy is sometimes known as Community Supported Energy (CSE). CSE projects are somewhat similar to Community Supported Agriculture (CSA). The main difference, however, is that instead of investing in potatoes, carrots, or cucumbers, with CSE, local residents invest in energy projects that provide greater energy security and a wide variety of other benefits.

Many Advantages
A cooperative or community owned energy project offers many advantages. It stimulates the local economy by creating new jobs and new business opportunities for the community while simultaneously expanding the tax base and generating new income for local residents. A locally owned energy project also generates support from the community by getting people directly involved.

Another advantage of community energy projects is that they can be owned cooperatively or collectively through a variety of legal mechanisms. Ownership strategies can include limited liability corporations (LLCs), cooperatives, school districts, municipal utilities or other municipal entities, or combinations of these models. Sometimes a partnership with an existing utility can be mutually beneficial.

An excellent example of this approach is the prominent, commercial-scale wind turbine located on Toronto’s (Ontario) harbor front that is 50 percent owned by WindShare, a 427-member cooperative of local residents, while the other half is owned by Toronto Hydro Energy Services. While the appropriate model will differ from project to project and from state to state (or province), depending on a wide range of variables, what these strategies all have in common is some form of community ownership and group benefit.

The main point is to identify the project as belonging to the community, which may avoid (or at least minimize) the usual conflicts between local residents and developers, whose large-scale, commercial proposals are often viewed as primarily benefiting absentee owners. Local ownership is the key ingredient that transforms what would otherwise be just another corporate energy project into an engine for greater energy security that directly benefits its owners — the members of the community.

Community Supported Energy projects offer yet another advantage; they retain a greater amount of income in the local area and increase the economic benefits substantially over projects owned by out-of-area developers, according to a study conducted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) for the Government Accountability Office. NREL compared the effect of large corporate wind farms owned out of area with similar projects owned locally.

The study found local ownership yielded an average of $4 million in local income annually, over three times more than the $1.3 million produced with out-of-area control, while job creation was more than twice as large in the local model.*

A European Model
With benefits like these, why aren’t there more CSE projects? For one thing it’s a relatively new concept in North America, although it’s a well-established strategy in many European nations. In Denmark and Germany — world leaders in wind energy development — many commercial-scale wind turbines are installed as single units or in small clusters distributed across the countryside, or sometimes in or near urban areas. And many of these turbines are either owned by the farmers on whose land the turbine stands, or by groups of local residents.

This idea has spread to many other EU nations as well and is beginning to catch on in Canada and the United States, especially in states like Minnesota and Iowa, where dozens of community owned wind farms are sprouting up.

One of the best examples is MinWind, located near Luverne, Minnesota. The original project, which began in 2000, consisted of four 950-kilowatt turbines owned by 66 local farmers. The project was so successful that seven additional turbines were added in 2004. The second group of turbines is owned by approximately 200 local investors.

One of the main reasons for this success has been Minnesota’s progressive promotion and support of locally owned wind projects and other renewable energy initiatives.

The main barrier to wide-scale implementation of Community Supported Energy in most other states, however, is a regulatory environment and process that does virtually nothing to encourage these types of projects. For the most part, CSE isn’t even on the radar screen of most regulators, and the typical high cost of the approval process (often $100,000 to $500,000 or more) halts most community based initiatives before they even get started.

What’s more, federal energy production tax credits (PTC) for wind farms, for example, favor large-scale corporate projects that are well beyond the means of local communities. This situation needs to change, and it needs to change soon, because all viable forms of renewable energy, regardless of their size, need to be supported and encouraged if we are going to meet the substantial energy challenges of the next few decades.

One of the best regulatory models in North America at the present time is the new Standard Offer Contracts in Ontario. Announced early in 2006, the new Standard Offer Contracts (Advanced Renewable Tariffs) are an historic step towards a sustainable energy future. Standard Offer Contracts allow homeowners, landowners, farmers, co-operatives, schools, municipalities and others to install renewable energy projects up to 10 megawatts in size and to sell the power to the grid for a fixed price for 20 years.

The Ontario Standard Offer Contracts provide a powerful model that other provinces and states should consider when developing their own renewable energy laws and regulations.

Security and Opportunity
Community-based energy strategies generally place the renewable energy facility as close as possible to where it is needed. In the case of electricity generation, this reduces the need for additional, ugly and expensive high-tension power lines, while simultaneously improving the stability of the electricity network. One or two good sized wind turbines, for example, could provide much of the power needed for a school, business or manufacturing facility.

A cluster of medium-to-large-sized turbines could power a whole neighborhood or small community. Add a significant number of rooftop solar panels, small-scale hydroelectric or geoelectric plants, ground-source heat pumps, and a local cooperative bio-fuels facility or two for biodiesel, ethanol, wood chips or pellets, and you begin to assemble a picture of greater energy security that provides for a significant proportion of your community’s energy needs while generating income, all from local resources.

The people employed to operate and maintain these facilities keeps them working (and spending) in their local communities, and eliminates the need for them to commute somewhere else to get to their jobs. The result is energy creation and conservation at the same time. And if the renewable energy facilities power other job-creating activities, such as local manufacture of essential products, you end up boosting the local economy while creating even more jobs. It’s a win-win-win proposition.

The energy challenges we face are enormous, consequently the response needs to be sized to match. Community Supported Energy offers the potential of making substantial progress on a large scale while directly engaging (and benefiting) a major segment of the population. CSE is an idea whose time has definitely arrived, and I am convinced that if this strategy were to be adopted across the nation that it could provide a huge boost to local economies everywhere while offering greater energy security and price stability.

The opportunities for locally based renewables are enormous. Almost every city and town in the country has the potential for one or more CSE project. Perhaps you can get one started in your community.

*Renewable Energy; Wind Power’s Contribution to Electric Power Generation and Impact on Farms and Rural Communities, General Accounting Office, September, 2004, 82, 83, www.gao.gov/new.items/d04756.pdf

Greg Pahl is a Weybridge, Vermont writer and co-founder of the Vermont Biofuels Association as well as the Addison County Relocalization Network. This article contains excerpts from his new book: The Citizen-Powered Energy Handbook: Community Solutions to a Global Crisis. The book’s primary focus is on Community Supported Energy.

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Reader Comments (2)

Author:
Rick Gladwin
Date Posted:
March 13, 2007
The Standard Offer Program (Advanced Renewable Tariffs) is certainly key to the growth and support of Community Supported Energy (aka Community Power) here in Ontario, and ARTs have been pivotal in the growth of the renewable energy industry in Europe.

For anyone interested in information about other community-based energy projects in Ontario, please see the following URL:

http://www.ontario-sea.org/membersfull.html

Rick Gladwin
Office and Communications Manager
Ontario Sustainable Energy Association
Comment 1 of 2
Author:
trevor witts
Date Posted:
March 14, 2007
Excellent article. In the Uk we talk about the concept of “nimby” not in my back yard. This attitude is usually displayed by locals and local communities towards externally driven developments.

Denmark has a very strong tradition of local community development based on local ownership which helps explain the old saying “your own pigs don’t stink”
If locals can be empowered it doesn’t take much to encourage them to support developments which will directly and locally be of benefit.

In light of the coal plant controversy; I wonder why the Journal World month after month continually declines or refuses to report on the proposal I’m offering to the power utilities, the people of Kansas and the State Legislature?

Is it that Mr. Simons and the moneyed elite own stock in companies that gleefully benefit from sucking life’s blood the defenseless under monopolistic practices?

“They control the dialogue on local news,” said Charles Goff III, 46, a political activist and artist in Lawrence. “Every viewpoint goes through their filter and is tied to the Chamber of Commerce and the moneyed elite.”

Mr. Simons and his news staff vehemently deny that controversial topics are sidestepped.

Ha Ha Right!!

———————————————————–

AAEC proposes that Kansas and AAEC partner to develop the Carbon Capture & Sequestration concept and capitalize on it by producing and exporting Kansas made systems for Community Scale Distributed Generation (DG)

Below from GLOBE-Net News

Carbon capture and storage - Reality or Illusion

Carbon capture and storage has become a hot topic in the business press recently, touted by some as the emission reducing key to continued use of fossil fuels, and panned by others as a great green scam perpetrated by the oil and gas industry. The truth is carbon capture and storage is anything but an illusion; but making it a commercial scale reality - at least in Canada - will require a great deal more than what has been put on the table so far.

Many countries are relying on CCS as one of the main technological fixes to the seemingly intractable problem of meeting their emission reduction commitments while continuing to source their energy needs from fossil fuels.

CCS is at the core of the recently announced federal strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The proposed regulatory regime will require that carbon capture and storage (CCS) be built into all new coal-fired power plants and oil sands facilities beginning in 2012, and be fully operating by 2018.

The Government of Alberta has committed to a 14-per-cent cut in emissions over 2005 levels by 2050 and has struck an industry-government council to develop a “made-in-Alberta plan” for the immediate advancement of carbon capture and storage technology.

Leaving aside the vagueness of both the Alberta and federal government strategy statements, the hard reality is that the technologies upon which CCS is based are still in their early stages and the likely costs for their full deployment on a scale that would actually make a difference in reducing CO₂ emissions are astronomical.

Conceptually, there is nothing particularly new in capturing and storing carbon. The technology to capture CO₂ and to pump it underground is commercially available and fairly well developed. Although CO₂ has been injected into geological formations for various purposes such as enhancing oil recovery from near depleted oil reservoirs, the long term storage of CO₂ is a relatively untried concept. No large scale power plant in the world operates with a full carbon capture and storage system.

Canada is among the world’s leaders in terms of research in this area. EnCana Corporation, one of North America’s leading natural gas producers, manages the world’s largest greenhouse gas sequestration project at its Weyburn Saskatchewan oilfield operation.

EnCana purchases CO₂ from a coal gasification plant in North Dakota and ships it to Weyburn via pipeline. Apart from giving new life to an old field, the Weyburn sequestration project, a world-scale research initiative operated under the auspices of the International Energy Agency, has confirmed that Weyburn is a suitable reservoir for the long-term geological storage of CO_2.

As noted by Rhona DelFrari, EnCana’s Media Relations Advisor, the first phase of the IEA research project is already complete and the results suggest that more than 99% of the CO₂ sequestered at Weyburn will safely remain in the ground for at least 5,000 years.

CCS in geological formations involves injecting CO₂ into rock layers, usually depleted or near-depleted oil or gas fields, deep saline aquifers (porous rock layers containing salty water deep underground, or coal seams that cannot be mined.

A joint Alberta - Federal Government Task Force Report (Canada’s Fossil Energy Future: The Way Forward on Carbon Capture and Storage) released in January 2008, cites the stable sedimentary rock formations of the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin (WCSB) as Canada’s biggest advantage for CO₂ storage.

“The reservoirs that securely held Canada’s vast oil and gas reserves for hundreds of millions of years can be used to store CO₂, and the deep saline aquifers underlying these rock units hold several magnitudes more storage potential,” cites the report, which also notes that the co-location of large industrial GHG sources with this storage opportunity makes the WCSB a world-class location for CCS.

The Task Force report optimistically posits that CCS is unique in that it can be built on the technical and institutional base of the existing fossil energy infrastructure and can be implemented quickly (within a decade) using existing technology as the world develops next-generation, longer-term energy solutions.

The report’s observation with respect to the time line for CCS deployment is roughly consistent with other estimates. According to the Office of Technology Assessment at the German Parliament (TAB), CO₂ capture will become available for large scale use in 2020 at the earliest.

Where the problem arises, as pointed out by Bruce Cox, executive director of Greenpeace Canada in a March 18, 2008 Globe and mail commentary (Why Carbon Capture is an Illusion), even if CCS works it will kick in too late to avoid the worst excesses of climate change. Cox notes the international consensus is that global greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2015 then start falling to at least 50 per cent by 2050.

Industry’s own predictions don’t foresee carbon capture and storage becoming commercially viable before 2020 or 2030, and that will miss the critical threshold for turning things around, notes Cox.

He may be right, but that does not obviate the need to start the ball rolling now.

“By opposing CCS, environmental groups are gambling that we can make the huge cuts in CO2 emissions we need simply by improving our energy efficiency and using renewables like solar and wind power. They may be right. But if they’re wrong, they could cripple action against climate change - the greatest environmental threat of our age. It’s a dangerous, and seriously imprudent, gamble.” - Thomas Homer-Dixon.

Canada’s efforts to date are promising, but not nearly enough. The recent federal budget provided $240 million in trust for a full-scale commercial demonstration of carbon capture and storage in the coal-fired electricity sector. This is based on the premise that reducing carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants will make a significant contribution to achieving Canada’s greenhouse gas emission reduction objectives.

Budget 2008 also provided $5 million to the Institute for Sustainable Energy, Environment and Economy at the University of Calgary to work with a broad range of stakeholders to resolve “a number of regulatory, economic, and technological issues that need to be resolved to accelerate deployment of carbon capture and storage technologies.”

As noted in a recent GLOBE-Net editorial (Budget 2008 - More Blue than Green), the jury is still out as to how effective the measures announced in Budget 2008 will be in terms of stimulating the development and commercialization of the technologies needed to cope with the inevitable impacts of climate change. But with respect to carbon capture and storage, a great deal more that $240 million will be required.

Alberta’s plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions involves fines for companies that exceed per-barrel emissions limits. Such fines are expected to put upwards of $177 million a year into the government’s Climate Change and Emissions Management Fund, proceeds from which will help pay for projects that reduce the cost of separating carbon dioxide from other emissions or support carbon capture and storage.

It still won’t be enough to make serious inroads into changing industry behavior or to bring on line a network of carbon capture pipelines and sequestration facilities.

The European Union is well aware of this fact. In January 2008 the EU Commission set out a Directive to enable environmentally-safe capture and geological storage of carbon dioxide in the EU as part of a major legislative package designed to balance the need for urgent action to tackle climate change with the need to ensure security of energy supply. The plan calls for a suite of technologies that would ensure the carbon dioxide emitted by industrial processes can be captured and stored underground and financial aid to enable member governments to support CCS demonstration plants.

Canadian governments, Canadian industry and Canadian consumers will have to spend a great deal more than what is already on the table to finance proving the technological and commercial feasibility of CCS and to deploy that technology on a scale sufficient to make a real difference.

It is the prospect of big money and big profits that has caused some environmental groups to pan CCS as “a public relations smokescreen for the tar sands and coal-fired electricity generation” industries.

As noted by David Keith at the University of Calgary and Thomas Homer-Dixon at the University of Toronto CCS will be a big-industry technology that will require huge outlays of capital, armies of scientists, engineers and construction workers, and will also generate huge profits.

“So when environmental groups saw that industry representatives dominated the blue-ribbon panel, they assumed that the energy industry was once again positioning itself to line its pockets, and attacked its recommendations”, the two note in a recent Globe and Mail article entitled A Win-Win-Win Situation.

They point out that “It’s time that Canada’s environmental groups freed themselves of this ideological straitjacket. They need to acknowledge that modern capitalism is the most dynamic, innovative and adaptive economic system human beings have ever invented.”

They note also that while capitalism has fuelled our climate problem and that many big businesses have lobbied hard to block serious action, the world is not going to solve the problem without capitalism’s help, “albeit capitalism that’s ultimately guided by strong government imposed constraints.”

This point was made very clear during the recently concluded GLOBE 2008 Conference in a Special Session on Carbon Capture and Storage. The assembled group of experts noted that CCS is proven, safe and Canada’s best option for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but the technology will not become commercially viable without government assistance.

The unanimous opinion of each panelist was that CCS technology was ready for further development and deployment, but without proper climate change regulation and a realistic price on carbon, large scale projects were too risky and potentially uneconomical. (See GLOBE-Net article GLOBE 2008 Session Update: Carbon Capture and Storage)

The same point was made in a recent report from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) that stressed CCS was the critical enabling technology that would help reduce CO₂ emissions significantly while also allowing coal to meet the world’s pressing energy needs. The two key factors needed to ensure its deployment were a significant charge for GHG emissions (a ‘carbon price’), and “large-scale demonstration projects of the technical, economic and environmental performance of CCS”, said the expert panel behind the report. (See GLOBE-Net article: Is ’Clean’ Coal Possible?)

Carbon capture and storage is definitely not an illusion; but making it a commercial scale reality - at least in Canada - will require a great deal more than what has been put on the table to date. The Weyburn Saskatchewan project is a start; but much, much more will be required.

Information Sources

IPCC Special Report Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage

Canada’s Fossil Energy Future: The Way Forward on Carbon Capture and Storage

IEA GHG Weyburn-Midale CO2 Monitoring and Storage Project

The Canadian CO₂ Capture and Storage Technology Network

Please see the Babcock Power & ThermoEnergy announcement below and remember on that on March 11 you responded to my proposal of collaboration in clean community energy technology saying; Westar has many internal and external experts on the topics you have mentioned” and ” I’m confident we have the proper amount of consultation we need.” and “I don’t see a role for you as a consultant.

Now we learn that Babcock Power & ThermoEnergy is announcing a carbon capture and clean energy project very similar in concept to what I proposed and it seems it is apparently about to get underway. I believe the Babcock Power & ThermoEnergy project is not likely as fuel flexible and scaleable and focused on distributed generation at the community level as the AAEC technology is. Nor is it as advanced in concept due to the above.

Therefore; in light of the new information that just emerged from Babcock Power & ThermoEnergy; I would like to once more inquire if you see any need to reconsider my proposal and reconsider the Westar business model of centralized power? Again I would like to ask if you are willing to discuss the very real and now more clearly visible possibilities embodied in the collaboration I proposed in new clean energy technology along the lines of Babcock’s but focused more on the needs of all counties and communities in Kansas.

Again I would like to stress that I believe community energy is the coming thing whether Westar recognizes it or not, and my company AAEC has developed and patented technology for conversion of the same feedstocks Babcock is focusing on and the AAEC technology (if co-developed with Westar’s participation) could be manufactured in Kansas and be made available to Westar energy for unlimited applications in all of the Kansas counties Westar delivers services to.

Westar has a responsibility to its customers. It also has a location alongside the Lawrence Energy Center that could serve as the technology development site. I’m referring to the former Callery Chemical plant site.

Don’t you understand that my proposal is worthy of further consideration with our energy future so much “up in the air” these days? The Lawrence paper today is reporting….

Is Westar willing to stand aside and let Topeka shift the Kansas clean energy development effort to Western Kansas and see its customers pay for this shift?

Or does Westar intend to seek its own 2 cent per meter charge while also ignoring advanced energy technology developed by a Westar customer right under Westar’s nose and ignore the emerging carbon capture market?

Les Blevins
AAEC

Babcock Power & ThermoEnergy Join Forces To Develop Advanced Carbon Capture Power Plant

© Business Wire 2008
2008-04-29

www.babcockpower.com - Technical Contact: Babcock Power Environmental Inc. Eric Balles, 508-854-4004 Sr. VP Engineering & Technology or Media contact: Babcock Power Inc. Steven E. Sabo, 508-854-3630 Director, Marketing & Communications Babcock Power Inc. of Danvers, Massachusetts and ThermoEnergy Corporation (”ThermoEnergy”) (OTCBB: TMEN), announce the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding as a prelude to the formation of a joint effort to commercialize the Company’s zero air emission power plant design called ThermoEnergy Integrated Power System (”TIPS”). Based on pressurized oxy-fuel combustion technology, TIPS converts coal, natural gas, oil, and biomass into energy with near-zero air emissions. In addition, it captures carbon dioxide (”CO2″) in a clean pressurized form ready for sequestration or beneficial reuse such as secondary and tertiary oil recovery.

“As an industry and market leader in environmental air pollution controls, combustion technology, steam generation and thermal processes for the power generation industry, Babcock Power is ideally positioned to commercialize this revolutionary process,” stated James F. Wood, President and CEO of Babcock Power Inc. “Our long history and extensive expertise in designing and furnishing steam generators, combustion systems, and a wide variety of heat exchangers, including the application of in-house heat transfer and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modeling capabilities, and ThermoEnergy’s commitment to the advancement of new technology, positions us together to play a significant role in the reduction of global greenhouse gases.”

“The commitment from a company of the size and capabilities as Babcock Power marks a pivotal point in the development and commercialization of this important and timely new technology,” said Dennis Cossey, Chairman and CEO of ThermoEnergy. “Achieving zero air emissions from fossil fuel power plants has long represented the ultimate goal within the energy industry and with Babcock Power joining the effort I am confident we are on the verge of realizing this goal,” said Cossey.

“The simplicity and efficiency of the TIPS approach offers a reliable and cost effective design for carbon-capture, near-zero emission power plants,” said Alex Fassbender, President of ThermoEnergy Power Systems, LLC. “With relatively few unit operations, TIPS enhances power plant reliability, while its process efficiency comes from recovering the latent heat of vaporization of produced and entrained water. Adding a second reheat to the steam cycle efficiency, coupled with a simple, low-energy process to recover pipeline quality CO2 gives TIPS a competitive edge over other conversion technologies,” said Fassbender.

Babcock and ThermoEnergy engineers will begin work immediately to finalize the data needed to design, construct and operate a large-scale pilot plant at a host site.

Babcock Power Inc., (www.babcockpower.com) through its subsidiaries, is one of the world’s leading suppliers of technology, equipment, and services to the power generation industry. Babcock Power subsidiary companies include; Vogt Power International (Louisville, KY), Thermal Engineering International (USA) Inc. (Santa Fe Springs, CA), Babcock Power Environmental, Riley Power Inc. and Babcock Power Services (Worcester, MA), Boiler Tube Company of America (Lyman, SC), and TEi Construction Services, Inc. (Duncan, SC).

ThermoEnergy Corporation is a diversified technologies company engaged in the worldwide commercialization of patented and/or proprietary municipal and industrial wastewater treatment and power generation technologies. The wastewater treatment technologies are consolidated in our subsidiary, CASTion Corporation (”CASTion”), a fast growing developer and manufacturer of innovative wastewater treatment and recovery systems to industrial and municipal clients. The systems are unique because they meet environmental regulations while providing a rapid return on investment by recovering and reusing expensive feedstock’s, reducing contaminated wastewater discharge and reusing wastewater in process operations. CASTion’s wastewater treatment systems have application in aerospace, food processing, metal finishing, refineries, manufacturing and municipal wastewater. We assemble and ship our waste water treatment products from our 20,000 square foot manufacturing facility in Worcester, Massachusetts. The power generation technologies are consolidated in our subsidiary, ThermoEnergy Power Systems, LLC (”TEPS”). The economic and environmental matrix of the Company’s technologies represents a paradigm shift in these key infrastructure industries. The Company currently has offices in Little Rock, AR, Worcester, MA, Hudson, MA, and New York, NY, Jacksonville, FL and Baton Rouge, LA. Additional information on the Company and its technologies can be found on its website at (www.thermoenergy.com), or (www.castion.com) for wastewater treatment specific information.

THIS PRESS RELEASE INCLUDES STATEMENTS THAT MAY CONSTITUTE “FORWARD LOOKING” STATEMENTS, USUALLY CONTAINING THE WORD “BELIEVE”, “ESTIMATE”, “PROJECT”, “EXPECT” OR SIMILAR EXPRESSIONS. FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS INHERENTLY INVOLVE RISKS AND UNCERTAINTIES THAT COULD CAUSE ACTUAL RESULTS TO DIFFER MATERIALLY FROM THE FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS. FACTORS THAT WOULD CAUSE OR CONTRIBUTE TO SUCH DIFFERENCES INCLUDE, BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO, CONTINUED ACCEPTANCE OF THE COMPANY’S PRODUCTS AND SERVICES IN THE MARKETPLACE, COMPETITIVE FACTORS, CHANGES IN REGULATORY ENVIRONMENTS AND OTHER RISKS DETAILED IN THE COMPANY’S PERIDOIC REPORT FILINGS WITH THE SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION. BY MAKING THESE FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS, THE COMPANY UNDERTAKES NO OBLIGATION TO UPDATE THESE STATEMENTS FOR REVISIONS OR CHANGES.

¶ Babcock Power and ThermoEnergy Sign Agreement to Pursue
Development and Commercialization of the TIPS Technology