Sep 12, 2006 9:58 pm US/Central
Texas Mayors Gear Up For Possible TXU Fight
by Sarah Dodd
DALLAS (CBS 11 News) ―
Mayors throughout Texas are gearing up for a fight that may land them in a courtroom, facing off with the states largest energy giant - TXU.
Dallas Mayor Laura Miller is leading the charge and she invited CBS 11 News along to see first hand the alternatives to coal plants in Texas.
The burning question across much of the state is, how to solve the energy crunch in Texas and mayors from 16 cities say they have come together to protect the states air quality.
"I think it's an awakening fight. Mayors, we can do it in Texas and we're not taking no for an answer," Miller said.
There are currently applications for 17 new coal plants in Texas. Eleven of those applications are from TXU.
Mayor Miller wants to make sure she's not left in the dark. So far, she has visited two TXU plants, and this week traveled to Florida to explore an alternative energy source - gasification.
There are three gasification plants in the United States like the one in Florida, but they cost ten percent more to build. Now the Dallas City Council is trying to decide if building a plant in North Texas is worth it.
TXU insists the plants they are proposing are a cleaner energy source than gasification or the current coal plants in Texas.
The Florida plant CBS 11 News toured has been running for 10 years, but it only serves about 75,000 households and last year the plant had an outage that took 100 days to repair. Residents never lost power because of a backup system, but TXU says that's not a risk it's willing to take.
"We are making a 10 billion dollar investment. We have to make sure we can keep the power on," said Kim Morgan, TXU.
(CBS 11 News)
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