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A group of Naperville residents packed a recent council meeting at city hall to call on council members to “Say No to Coal.”
Brian Hill/bhill@dailyherald.com, June 2024
While Naperville officials are far from deciding whether to renew a contract with the city’s power provider, a group of residents and environmental advocates are raising concerns about extending the pact.
The Illinois Municipal Electric Agency has provided electricity to Naperville since 2011. The group serves roughly three dozen municipal electric utilities throughout the state.
The agency has minority ownership stakes in the Prairie State Generating Co., a coal-fired power plant in southwestern Illinois, and the Trimble County facility in Kentucky, according to its annual report.
“The emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from the burning of coal and other fossil fuels is rapidly warming the planet. This is settled science,” said Paul Bloom, a physics professor at North Central College in Naperville.
Bloom has joined other residents in urging city leaders to “Say No to Coal” and reject an extension of the IMEA contract. The group wore red, held signs and packed the city council chambers during a meeting on Jan. 21.
“For over a decade, IMEA has provided our city with low-cost, reliable energy, and we should be thankful for that. They’ve done a great job, but the times have changed,” said Fernando Arriola, community relations chair for the Naperville Environment and Sustainability Task Force, or NEST.
The existing IMEA contract is set to expire in 2035. The agency has proposed an extension through May 2055.
“We negotiated in good faith to have this decision process in the year 2030, so I really don’t see the rush to make any decision right now,” city council member Ian Holzhauer said.
The city has hired a consultant to lay out Naperville’s energy options. Officials expect Customized Energy Solutions to deliver its report by the end of February.
“One thing that I have heard in recent years, especially in this last year, is storage, peak shaving, and self-generation is going to be where it’s at. And those are three elements of the contract that is proposed right now that we’re not allowed to do,” Mayor Scott Wehrli said.
“So I’ve got some challenges with that. I would not sign that contract if it was my own business right now,” Wehrli added.
The city has called a special meeting of the Public Utilities Advisory Board to review the consultant’s report. The city council is expected to hold an April workshop, which would include Customized Energy Solutions presenting their findings and options for council members and the public. If needed, a second workshop would follow.
Four council seats, meanwhile, are up for election in April.
The city entered into its long-term contract with IMEA back in 2007.
At the time, the community still had open land being developed, and leaders anticipated more development in the coming decade, said Brian Groth, Naperville’s electric utility director.
“Because of Naperville’s size, we had to make sure that IMEA could handle our base load needs,” Groth told the council last year. “Therefore, the contract required IMEA to participate in the Prairie State generation campus so that they would have the resources necessary to meet our electricity needs.”
How much of Naperville’s electricity is derived from coal?
“What IMEA is putting into the market on Naperville’s behalf is about 80% coal. What’s actually being delivered is the real-time energy that’s being delivered, which is probably closer to that 16%,” Groth said Tuesday in response to a question from Councilman Josh McBroom about a diagram on the “Say No to Coal” website.
Bloom, the North Central professor, called for finding a clean supplier of electricity through an open bidding process.
“Burning coal for electricity in 2025 is like using whale oil lamps for lighting or covered wagons for transportation,” he said. “Coal is technology that is on the way out because it is being replaced by something cleaner, cheaper and simply better.”
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