Two Utilities Are Leaving Clean Coal Initiative

Two of the nation’s biggest coal-burning utilities said Thursday that they were withdrawing from a $2.4 billion project to demonstrate carbon capture and storage, and would instead pursue their own work in the field. The announcement by the utilities, Southern Company and American Electric Power, is a blow to the multinational consortium called the FutureGen Alliance. The group is seeking to build a $2.4 billion plant in Mattoon, Ill., that would convert coal to a fuel gas, capture the carbon dioxide and then burn the gas in a turbine to make electricity. Financing for the project was uncertain even before the announcement by the two utilities. The Bush administration had tried to kill FutureGen, saying it was too expensive. But the Obama administration said last week it would restore financing...NYTimes