According to this AP story

Alabama Power Co. is exploring the option of making electricity solely by burning wood or other “biomass.”
Under a study to be completed in the second half of this year, the state’s top power provider is looking into converting a coal-fired generating unit at one of its facilities.

Among the sites under consideration is Barry Steam Plant in north Mobile County.

The amount of power involved would be 70 to 80 megawatts, according to a description of the project recently released by the city of Mobile. That’s a fraction of the company’s total output but still enough to light thousands of homes.

…

“I think it’s more of a pre-emptive effort,” Adam Snyder, executive director of Conservation Alabama, said of the Alabama Power study, adding that he considers it “a great move.”
Along the same lines, Georgia Power Co., another affiliate of Atlanta-based Southern Company, is seeking regulators’ permission to convert a small coal-fired plant to biomass, said Anne Blair of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, another advocacy group headquartered in Knoxville, Tenn.

…

“I think they are doing a good job in terms of anticipating what is likely to be coming down the pipeline at the federal level and simply diversifying their energy mix,” said Blair, who is the alliance’s program manager for diesel and biofuels.

One of the new items of the Energy & Environment Agenda of the Obama administration is to “Ensure 10 percent of our electricity comes from renewable sources by 2012, and 25 percent by 2025.”  It will be interesting how utilities without access to abundant wind or solar resources comply with new energy regulations.

More on biomass at WikiPedia.

More on biomass at Alabama Power’s Biomass Energy page.

“If we lose control of coal, we will have lost control of the climate,” said Markey. “This bill will make companies prepare for the future and prevent them from building low-tech coal-fired power plants before a global warming bill is passed that will necessitate the use of the newest, most climate-friendly technology.”

Without emissions controls, a new coal-fired power plant will emit hundreds of millions of tons of global warming pollution over its 50 year lifetime, the lawmakers said. Over 100 new plants have been proposed, and even if just a portion of these are built, they will emit over a 100 million tons of carbon dioxide a year.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs, discusses the latest climate data and temperature trends. She points out that NASA’s Aqua satellite, launched in 2002, and the results of other recent climate models show that global temperatures have plateaued over the past eight years and that the earth’s climate has shown signs of being able to regulate its temperature more effectively than previously thought.

Here’s an excerpt of the interview:

Duffy asked Marohasy: “Is the Earth stillwarming?”

She replied: “No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you’d expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years.”

Duffy: “Is this a matter of any controversy?”

Marohasy: “Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued … This is not what you’d expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you’d expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up … So (it’s) very unexpected, not something that’s being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it’s very significant.”

Duffy: “It’s not only that it’s not discussed. We never hear it, do we? Whenever there’s any sort of weather event that can be linked into the global warming orthodoxy, it’s put on the front page. But a fact like that, which is that global warming stopped a decade ago, is virtually never reported, which is extraordinary.”

Duffy then turned to the question of how the proponents of the greenhouse gas hypothesis deal with data that doesn’t support their case. “People like Kevin Rudd and Ross Garnaut are speaking as though the Earth is still warming at an alarming rate, but what is the argument from the other side? What would people associated with the IPCC say to explain the (temperature) dip?”

Marohasy: “Well, the head of the IPCC has suggested natural factors are compensating for the increasing carbon dioxide levels and I guess, to some extent, that’s what sceptics have been saying for some time: that, yes, carbon dioxide will give you some warming but there are a whole lot of other factors that may compensate or that may augment the warming from elevated levels of carbon dioxide.

“There’s been a lot of talk about the impact of the sun and that maybe we’re going to go through or are entering a period of less intense solar activity and this could be contributing to the current cooling.”

Duffy: “Can you tell us about NASA’s Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we’re now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?”

Marohasy: “That’s right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you’ve got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you’re going to get a positive feedback. That’s what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite … (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they’re actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you’re getting a negative rather than a positive feedback.”

Duffy: “The climate is actually, in one way anyway, more robust than was assumed in the climate models?”

Marohasy: “That’s right … These findings actually aren’t being disputed by the meteorological community. They’re having trouble digesting the findings, they’re acknowledging the findings, they’re acknowledging that the data from NASA’s Aqua satellite is not how the models predict, and I think they’re about to recognise that the models really do need to be overhauled and that when they are overhauled they will probably show greatly reduced future warming projected as a consequence of carbon dioxide.”

Duffy: “From what you’re saying, it sounds like the implications of this could beconsiderable …”

Marohasy: “That’s right, very much so. The policy implications are enormous. The meteorological community at the moment is really just coming to terms with the output from this NASA Aqua satellite and (climate scientist) Roy Spencer’s interpretation of them. His work is published, his work is accepted, but I think people are still in shock at this point.”