Environment

A conference on renewable energy that was scheduled for next month has been pushed back to March 2013.

This year’s Kentucky Statewide Workshop on Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency—organized by the Conn Center at the U of L—was supposed to be next month. But Conn Center Assistant Director Andrew Marsh says the center just decided that more academic speakers would be available at a different time of year.

Louisville's Air Pollution Control District has fined Louisville Gas and Electric for several violations at the Cane Run Power Station in southwest Louisville.

The summer has just begun, and Louisville has already seen dangerously high levels of ozone pollution on thirteen days. Scientists are predicting that ozone could become an even bigger problem as average temperatures rise.

Ozone is created when pollution from cars and smokestacks cooks in summer heat. Louisville’s seen a lot of it lately, and nearly every week there’s been at least one warning that the air outside could be unhealthy for at least some people.

A major coal company with mines in Appalachia and Western Kentucky has filed for bankruptcy. In a news release, Patriot Coal said it was undertaking the move to facilitate restructuring.

For the first time since the federal government has begun collecting data, natural gas and coal produce virtually the same amount of the country’s electricity.

The Energy Information Administration just crunched its numbers for this past April, and preliminary data shows that both coal and natural gas make up about 32 percent of the country’s total electricity generation.