The Role of Wyoming's Energy in Solving National Electricity Crisis

Recent electric power shortages in various parts of the US stimulated a peak on generation capacity additions during the first three years of this new century. Most of the newly added units are fired by natural gas, a clean but expensive energy resource. The rapid increase in the use of natural gas makes its price ever increasing and volatile. Coal-fired plants are expected to be more promising for providing cheaper electricity in the near future. Coal will continue to be the primary energy source in electricity generation at least through 2030. Wyoming is the largest coal producing state and one of the largest in natural gas production in the US, but local utilization is extremely low. In addition to exporting raw energy resources, Wyoming could help the nation to solve its electrical energy crisis better by exporting energy directly using high voltage DC (HVDC) lines. The current electrical energy situations of the US and Wyoming are examined and some transmission schemes are proposed in this study. Economic analysis of the proposed schemes is also performed