The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally owned electric utility corporation in the United States. TVA's service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. While owned by the federal government, TVA receives no taxpayer funding and operates similarly to a private for-profit company. It is headquartered in Knoxville, Tennessee, and is the sixth-largest power supplier and largest public utility in the country.
Marvin Travis Runyon was an American business executive and civil servant. He had a long career as a manufacturing executive at Ford Motor Company until his retirement, then joined Nissan as head of North American operations. He later served as chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and as U.S. Postmaster General. He was a forceful and charismatic figure who picked up the nicknames "Marvelous Marv" and "Carvin' Marvin".
The Bellefonte Nuclear Generating Station (BLN) is an unfinished nuclear power plant in Hollywood, Alabama, United States.
Rural electrification is the process of bringing electrical power to rural and remote areas. Rural communities are suffering from colossal market failures as the national grids fall short of their demand for electricity. As of 2019, 770 million people live without access to electricity – 10.2% of the global population. Electrification typically begins in cities and towns and gradually extends to rural areas, however, this process often runs into obstacles in developing nations. Expanding the national grid is expensive and countries consistently lack the capital to grow their current infrastructure. Additionally, amortizing capital costs to reduce the unit cost of each hook-up is harder to do in lightly populated areas. If countries are able to overcome these obstacles and reach nationwide electrification, rural communities will be able to reap considerable amounts of economic and social development.
Widows Creek Fossil Plant was a 1.6-gigawatt coal power plant, 4.8 miles (7.7 km) east of Stevenson, Alabama, USA. The plant, operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority, generated about nine billion kilowatt-hours of electricity a year. It had one of the tallest chimneys in the world at 305 metres (1,001 ft), which was built in 1977, and was removed December 3, 2020 in a controlled demolition. Along with the Chimney of the Harllee Branch Power Plant, it is the tallest chimney to be demolished in the United States.
Kingston Fossil Plant, commonly known as Kingston Steam Plant, is a 1.4-gigawatt coal-fired power plant located in Roane County, just outside Kingston, Tennessee, on the shore of Watts Bar Lake. It is operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority. The plant is known for the Kingston Fossil Plant fly ash spill which occurred in December 2008.
Simon David Freeman was an American engineer, attorney, and author, who had many key roles in energy policy. After working with the Tennessee Valley Authority, first as an engineer and later as an attorney, he was selected to sit on energy committees by Lyndon Johnson in 1967. He then worked with the United States Environmental Protection Agency, before returning to the TVA as chairman at the request of Jimmy Carter. After finishing his term, Freeman headed several public utilities companies, most notably the New York Power Authority, the Sacramento Municipal Utility District and the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.
New Energy for America was a plan led by Barack Obama and Joe Biden beginning in 2008 to invest in renewable energy sources, reduce reliance on foreign oil, address global warming issues, and create jobs for Americans. The main objective of the New Energy for America plan was to implement clean energy sources in the United States to switch from nonrenewable resources to renewable resources. The plan led by the Obama Administration aimed to implement short-term solutions to provide immediate relief from pain at the pump, and mid- to- long-term solutions to provide a New Energy for America plan. The goals of the clean energy plan hoped to: invest in renewable technologies that will boost domestic manufacturing and increase homegrown energy, invest in training for workers of clean technologies, strengthen the middle class, and help the economy.
California Proposition 7, would have required California utilities to procure half of their power from renewable resources by 2025. In order to make that goal, levels of production of solar, wind and other renewable energy resources would more than quadruple from their current output of 10.9%. It would also require California utilities to increase their purchase of electricity generated from renewable resources by 2% annually to meet Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) requirements of 40% in 2020 and 50% in 2025. Current law AB32 requires an RPS of 20% by 2010.
Tom D. Kilgore was the federal corporation's first Chief Executive Officer. He was appointed by the Tennessee Valley Authority Board of Directors on October 13, 2006, at a meeting in Knoxville. The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2005 established the CEO position as part of the change in governance structure from a three-member board to the current nine-member board. He earned $4.029 million in federal fiscal year 2012. He retired at the end of 2012 and was succeeded by Bill Johnson.
The Shawnee Fossil Plant is a coal-fired power plant owned and operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority, located near Paducah, Kentucky. The closest city is Metropolis, Illinois, across the Ohio River to the northeast. The Shawnee Fossil Plant was created with the intentions of providing sufficient electricity to the national defense industry escalating demand for power which could not be met with the Commonwealth of Kentucky's then-current infrastructure. The plant also provided economic growth to the area in the post-WWII era creating jobs and a stronger infrastructure to support future state developments.
The Paradise Combined Cycle Plant is a natural gas power plant operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). Located just east of Drakesboro, Kentucky, it was the highest power capacity power plant in Kentucky. The plant currently has a capacity of 1.02-gigawatts. The plant originally consisted of three coal units, with a combined capacity of 2,632 MW. Units 1 and 2 were retired in 2017, and replaced with the natural gas units, and Unit 3 was retired in 2020.
The Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC), established in 1982, is a non-profit organization working with clean energy. It is based in Latham, New York.
Solar power in Alabama on rooftops could theoretically provide 29.8% of all electricity used in Alabama, with 20,400 MW of solar panels potentially installed on rooftops.
Solar power in Virginia on rooftops is estimated to be capable of providing 32.4% of electricity used in Virginia using 28,500 MW of solar panels. Installing solar panels provides a 6.8% return on investment in Virginia, and a 5 kW array would return a profit of $16,041 over its 25 year life.
Wind power in Tennessee has most potential in East Tennessee along the North Carolina border. The state has not passed renewable portfolio standard legislation and there is just one utility-scale wind farm with 15 operating turbines and previously 3 test turbines. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), based in Knoxville, imports wind-generated electricity into its service area which includes Tennessee. US Senator Lamar Alexander from Tennessee is an outspoken critic of wind power.
Wind power in Kentucky has limited potential for development within the state since there are generally low wind speeds, though there are specific locations where it can be effective. The state has not passed renewable portfolio standard legislation and there are no commercial-scale wind turbines. Kentucky may benefit from the development of wind power in Tennessee, an adjoining state with which it is collaborating, and from efforts by the Tennessee Valley Authority to both develop and import wind-generated electricity into the region.
Stephen Anderson Smith is an American environmentalist, clean energy advocate and peace activist. He was a former Democratic nominee for Tennessee's 2nd congressional district in the United States House Representatives in 1996. In 1988, Smith was a cofounder of the Foundation for Global Sustainability and the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance (OREPA). He is currently the Executive Director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy and the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy Action Fund.
The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) is the largest 501(c)(3) environmental nonprofit organization in the southeastern United States, with more than 100 attorneys and 200 staff members overall working at the local, state, and federal level. Headquartered in Charlottesville, Virginia, SELC has nine offices in six states: Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. The organization also has an office on Capitol Hill.
