Duke Energy's coal, coal heart.

• Author: Gearino, G.D.
• Position: FINEPRINT

I don't know how much I'll like having Duke Energy Corp. as my power company. I've been a customer of Raleigh-based Progress Energy Inc., which Duke is proposing to swallow, for so long that I remember when it was called Carolina Power & Light. We've grown accustomed to each other. But I'll say one thing for Charlotte-based Duke: It sure knows how to electrify any conversation about the environment.

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It starts at the top. Duke CEO Jim Rogers (cover story, May 2010) is a guy with an odd, and seemingly contradictory, reputation: He's environmentally concerned and aware, as well as being a notable spewer of mammoth amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. (Rogers personally doesn't do the spewing, of course; I'm talking about his company, whose coal-fired power plants make it one of the most prolific emitters of carbon in the country.) A writer for The New York Times Magazine sought to get to the bottom of this contradiction three years ago, albeit without much success. After pointing out that Rogers hobnobs with environmental activists and generally supports their concerns about climate change, the writer noted that even after eight months of studying and interviewing Rogers, he never once heard the Duke CEO refer to his "polar-bear moment--the instant when [he] realized the earth is imperiled." Rogers' environmentalism isn't passionate, apparently; if anything, it's strangely wonky.

Then there's the ongoing saga of the new coal-fired power plant at Duke's Cliffside Steam Station, scheduled to come on line in 2012. Environmentalists hate it, largely because it's a $2 billion-plus investment in coal power at a time when climate change is the cause du jour. For its part, Duke Energy points out that the new plant will use the most efficient technologies to curb emissions and will replace older generating units that are less climate-friendly. If it turns out that carbon emissions from Cliffside decrease in the long run, activists have in effect been protesting on behalf of the carbon-spewing status quo--and against improvement.

All this brings us to the present. In the interest of not contributing any further to the ravaging of West Virginia's landscape, Duke Energy has expressed its desire to stop using "mountaintop coal," despite its relative cheapness. But it turns out it can't--because regulators like cheap coal more than they like the environment. See what I mean? Duke has a true gift for making things interesting, if not...