"Coal’s Decline Not Hurting Power Grid Reliability, Study Says"

"Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s electricity grid review is due out soon. Corporations and the wind industry just did their own study that counters his concerns."

"A new study is challenging Energy Secretary Rick Perry's concerns about increasing levels of renewable energy in the U.S. electric grid, arguing that the decline of coal in the nation's power mix is driven largely by market forces and is not hurting the reliability of the grid.

Perry in April ordered a 60-day grid review looking in particular at whether government support for renewable energy is speeding the retirement of coal and nuclear plants and resulting in a more fragile electricity supply. He suggested in his memo that renewable energy and regulatory burdens on coal were to blame for an "erosion of critical baseload resources."

The new study says that that fear is baseless, and it argues the opposite."

Nicholas Kusnetz reports for InsideClimate News June 21, 2017.