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Google Announces Gas-fired Broadwing Energy Project with CCS

LCG, October 23, 2025--Google announced today a first-of-its kind agreement to support a natural gas-fired power plant with carbon capture and storage (CCS). The 400-MW Broadwing Energy power project, located in Decatur, Illinois, will capture and permanently store its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. By agreeing to buy most of the power it generates, Google is helping get this new, baseload power source built and connected to the regional grid that supports our data centers.

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EPA Issues Class VI Well Permits to ExxonMobil for Carbon Capture and Storage Project in Texas

LCG, October 21, 2025--The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today issued three final Underground Injection Control (UIC) Class VI permits to ExxonMobil for their Rose Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Project located in Jefferson County, Texas. Under the Safe Drinking Water Act, these permits allow ExxonMobil to convert three existing test wells permitted by the state to carbon dioxide (CO2) storage injection wells for long-term storage.

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Industry News

California Flubbed Power Buys, Audit Says

LCG, Dec. 21, 2001--The rush early this year by California Gov. Gray Davis to "lock up" through long-term contracts with independent power producers sufficient electricity to meet the state's needs for a decade or more was described by critics at the time as a "long-term fix for a short-term problem."

It could turn out to be worse than that, according to a state audit released yesterday of the $43 billion portfolio of power contracts negotiated by the California Department of Water Resources.

While the audit recognizes that the state was a desperate buyer in a seller's market, it also notes that the CDWR negotiators were amateurs dealing with old pros -- lambs among wolves. Concessions made to power producers could result in the cost of the power exceeding the contracts by hundreds of millions of dollars, according to the report by state auditor Elaine Howle.

CDWR negotiators agreed to provisions in some of the contracts that would allow power producers to temporarily back out of their obligation to deliver electricity. They also agreed in several instances to pay power prices above those specified in the contracts in order to protect the power producers from certain cost increases such as tax increases, imposition of pollution penalties and new clean air laws and regulations.

Critics say those possible cost increases are risks ordinarily assumed by the seller.

"Although the department was in a weak bargaining position because of the financial crisis in the electricity markets, its rush to ease the electricity crisis by locking in power supply through long-term contracts weakened its position even further," the report said.

CDWR officials say the audit ignores the situation that existed when the contracts were negotiated last February and March. Rolling blackouts were a daily threat and spot market power prices were around $250 per megawatt-hour, far higher than the average of $69 per megawatt-hour called for in the contracts.

"It's easy to be a Monday morning quarterback," said Thomas Hannigan, director of the water agency.

Once the CDWR started signing contracts it couldn't stop, complain some critics, and the audit bears them out, saying that the state bought too much power for Southern California for delivery in 2004.

The fact is, the state may not have needed to purchase any power at all. A year ago, there was an insufficiency of generation in California and customary imports from the hydroelectric-rich Pacific Northwest were not forthcoming because of a severe drought in that region. Several new power plants have been commissioned in California this year and spot market prices have dropped back to about $25 per megawatt-hour.

California Secretary of State Bill Jones, a Republican gubernatorial candidate, used the audit to scathe Davis yesterday. "Today's audit speaks volumes of the Davis administration's gross mismanagement of the power crisis, particularly with his decision to commit more than $42 billion of California taxpayer and ratepayer dollars to poorly negotiated long-term power deals," Jones told a Sacramento press conference.

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