CEDAR RAPIDS – North Iowa’s top energy supplier to residents announced this week it is making changes to the company.
Alliant released its Corporate Sustainability Report (CSR) Thursday. It claims a goal of cutting carbon emissions 80% and eliminating all existing coal from its energy mix by 2050. The CSR can be accessed at alliantenergy.com/sustainability.
“Alliant Energy is acting today to create a better tomorrow for our customers and communities,” said Alliant Energy Chairman and CEO Patricia Kampling. “We are transforming our energy fleet with an eye on customer cost, carbon reduction and providing cleaner and reliable power to the communities we serve.”
Alliant’s plans are to spend more than $2 billion on new renewables, which will double the number of our wind sites from six to 12. Through this new construction and additional purchase agreements, Alliant says it will have more than 2,700 megawatts of wind power by 2021. Renewables will be over 30% of its energy mix by 2030.
According to AlliantEnergy, “These actions will enable us to exceed carbon reduction goals pledged originally by the U.S. under the voluntary United Nations Paris Accord. While the Accord calls for reducing carbon 32 percent below 2005 levels by 2030, our plans enable a 40% reduction by that time.”
Other highlights detailed in the CSR include:
– Accomplishing gender parity on the Board of Directors with 50 percent of members being women.
– Over $2.3 billion planned capital expenditures to build smarter and more resilient energy infrastructure in the next five years.
– Fossil fuel generation water withdrawals reduced by 40 percent since 2005 with plans targeting a reduction of 75 percent by 2030.
– Closure of all coal ash ponds by the end of 2023.
– Dubuque solar garden is the first Envision® Platinum-rated solar project in the nation.
– Rebates to 155 residential and 33 commercial customers for electric vehicle charging stations and non-road electrification uses, such as forklifts.
– Community investment of $7.3 million and 93,000 volunteer hours in 2017, including $2 million for electric and heating bill assistance to families in need.
In other news from Alliant, customers won in freeze of Alliant Energy Wisconsin rates
Alliant Energy said in a statement:
Our Wisconsin customers will see no increase to base electric and natural gas rates through 2020 under a verbal decision by the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (PSC).
The decision keeps base rates at 2017 levels while bringing the Riverside Energy Center, a new highly efficient natural gas generation facility, online in 2019. Reductions in operating costs, the addition of low-cost wind energy and savings from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act helped enable the freeze.
We reached agreement on the proposal with significant input and collaboration from several advocacy groups including the Citizens Utility Board and Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group.
The plan will be in effect 2019-2020, with no fuel-cost increase expected in 2019. We have held base electric and natural gas rates flat in six of the past eight years. Our retail electric rates are among the lowest in Wisconsin.
The written order is expected in the next several weeks.
