In reading the recent Utilipoint article on “What’s next for Greenhouse Gas”, I would have to say I agree with most of it. Noteworthy is that the US EPA's top two priorities are climate change and air emissions, a reminder of the central role the power generation industry plays in some of the most important public policy issues facing our Nation today.  I suspect, however, that the article may have been written before the most recent indications of how seriously the industry, the Obama Administration, and the US Senate are taking the need to get bi-partisan energy legislation passed this year.  Check out, for example, the front page of the Boston...
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Keeping up with developments in the bewildering array of emissions regulations facing our industry is always challenging.  I was reminded of that last week when caught surprised by the US EPA's announcement proposing a  new lower limit for ground-level ozone, a main component of smog, of between 60 and 70 parts per million (ppm).

These rules could more than double the number of counties across the country that are in violation of clean air standards and bring NOx regulation to places such as Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, the Dakotas, Kansas, Minnesota and Iowa that have thus far avoided much of the NOx regulations implemented over the last decade east of the Mississippi.

My most recent efforts to follow developments in federal NOx regulation had focused on how EPA is...
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I hope everyone’s having a wonderful holiday catching up with families and recharging batteries for the upcoming New Year. Come January 2nd we’ll be collectively rolling up our sleeves and figuring out how to best navigate the complex and uncertain issues currently affecting the US power generation industry. Looking forward, here are a few of the issues that will play out over the coming year.

Re-worked CAIR Rule
While the US EPA is still working on the court-ordered redesign of CAIR Phase 2, several states have filed their CAIR State Implementation Plans (SIPs) based on the same assumptions embedded in the original rule.  I suspect this approach is based on the fact that most states were relying on the original CAIR rule to meet...
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There’s nothing like a move to make one reflect on life’s milestones. Especially when that move is back to a place you’ve been before. That’s the situation I find myself in now as we prepare to move our Boston office from the Prudential Tower back to the John Hancock Tower, the building in which NeuCo was founded and located until our move almost three years ago.

It was in the Hancock Tower that I made the move from Charles River Associates (CRA), NeuCo’s majority investor, to become one of the founding members of NeuCo. I worked for 16 years in the Hancock Tower, and in the 10 of those years dedicated to NeuCo, I saw the company grow from an idea to become the leading provider of power plant combustion optimization solutions.

Our initial...
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