Construction of new powerplants and transmission lines is most likely to occur in markets where utilities can count on recouping the cost of their investments. Electric utility and construction executives also point to consistent government regulation as key to construction of energy projects. “Capital tends to be there” for investments that are made in markets where there are stable rules, said David Campbell, CEO of Dallas-based Luminant, the power-producing arm of the former TXU Corp., last month at the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners annual meeting in New Orleans. “Certainty would be nice, but consistency allows us to come
It is going to take a risk-based strategy on the federal, state and local levels to provide hurricane and flood protection in New Orleans and mitigate risk associated with disasters nationwide. “We are looking at a multihazard approach, multiple lines of defense and nonstructural methods, such as emergency preparedness for mitigating risk,” said Earthea Nance, New Orleans' first director of disaster mitigation planning, at last month’s annual meeting of the American Water Resources Association, in New Orleans. “The traditional disaster-protection paradigm is predicated on a strong federal role and a diminished local role. In New Orleans that resulted in an
Chesapeake Bay advocates are disappointed that U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state officials failed to set a firm deadline for reducing nutrient pollution in the 64,000-sq-mile Chesapeake Bay watershed at last month’s annual meeting of federal and state leaders overseeing the cleanup effort. Bay advocates are threatening legal action to force officials to commit to cleaning up the bay. “They didn’t commit to anything that is going to reduce pollution,” says Roy Hoagland, vice president for environ-mental protection and restoration of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. He says efforts to clean up the bay have been unsuccessful, even though billions of
Construction is beginning on the largest design-build civil works project in the history of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, a $695-million barrier designed to protect New Orleans from storm surges similar to that generated by Hurricane Katrina, which inundated the low-lying city in 2005. Slide Show Photo: Angelle Bergeron / ENR Surge barrier to protect New Orleans is the largest design-build job in Corps history. Related Links: Behind the Scenes in a Casting Yard Photo: Angelle Bergeron / ENR Mike Spruill Sr. says all his casting jobs post-Katrina are simply bigger. Barrier piles are 140 ft long. The Inner
In an attempt to build a strong case for sustainability, the U.S. General Services Administration is making its green practices public. GSA recently released a collection of case studies and best practices called “Sustainability Matters,” which offers examples of how the agency and its partners have executed sustainable strategies in acquiring, operating and maintaining GSA buildings. The 220-page publication is intended to help firms that work with the agency meet or exceed GSA’s sustainability goals. The agency has steadily increased green initiatives in recent years as it has faced looming federal mandates. These include the Energy Independence and Security Act
Washington state sued the U.S. Energy Dept. Nov. 26 in federal district court in Spokane for failing to meet key milestones for cleaning up 53 million gallons of high-level radioactive waste at its 586-square-mile Hanford former nuclear weapons site near the Columbia River. Photo: U.S. Energy Dept. Lengthy cleanup of aging waste tanks is lawsuit focus The lawsuit addresses DOE's pace in emptying 177 massive underground waste tanks, many of which date to the 1940s when atomic bombmaking began at Hanford, and are leaking into groundwater. The state is also demanding earlier completion of the site's $12.3-billion Waste Treatment Plant,
Intraparty politics are threatening infrastructure in Illinois, where state legislators remain deadlocked over a mammoth capital bill to fund road, transit, school and other projects.
As three new U.S. runways officially opened Nov. 20, the Federal Aviation Administration bill that would fund airport improvement grants, which would include a more streamlined process for future runway projects, still awaits reauthorization. The runways, opening at Washington Dulles, Chicago O’Hare and Seattle-Tacoma airports, will allow for 300,000 more flights nationwide annually, says FAA Acting Administrator Robert Sturgell. Nevertheless, a May 2007 FAA report identifies 14 airports that will soon face capacity constraints unless more new runways or new airports are built. FAA’s efforts to streamline the project-approval process have been hurt by the wait for reauthorization, says Sturgell.
For some, it is millions of dollars’ worth of deferred paving work. For others, it is billion-dollar highway expansions. Nationwide, state transportation departments are putting projects on hold due to shrinking budgets. Dwindling tax revenue from gas and other sources, a bleak economic environment and continued high materials costs are all taking their toll. An anticipated infrastucture-heavy stimulus package from the new Obama administration cannot come soon enough for industry officials. Photo: Brad Fullmer In Suspension. Planned major Utah highway projects are stalled for the time being. “In my 30 years in the industry, I’ve never seen anything like this,”
San Francisco’s $4.4-billion Hetch Hetchy Water System Improvement Project has passed a major milestone with the approval of its program environmental impact report. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission began planning for the program, consisting of 85 projects, in 2002 to improve the system’s ability to operate in the aftermath of a major earthquake. The program is funded by a bond issue approved by voters in 2002. Construction of many smaller projects has proceeded while the report was being completed on 17 larger sections valued at $1.8 billion. Construction on many major projects will begin in the next six to