The Midwest needs a strategic clean energy development plan that implements smart policies and practices to capture readily achievable environmental, public health and economic development benefits. This sustainable development strategy is good for the environment and the economy. The Clean Energy Development Plan proposes policies to implement underutilized energy efficiency technologies and to aggressively develop renewable energy resources. By diversifying a power supply that has relied on old, highly-polluting coal and nuclear plants, the Midwest will reduce pollution, improve electricity reliability, create new "green" manufacturing and installation jobs, and provide renewable energy "cash crops" for farmers. The Clean Energy Development Plan provides the strategies to achieve these goals.

The Midwest can seize the opportunity to develop its clean energy resources, including energy efficiency measures, as well as wind, biomass and solar power. The Clean Energy Development Plan achieves large environmental, public health and economic development benefits with only modest increases in cost. Moreover, investing in energy efficiency and renewable energy will diversify the region's electricity portfolio, thereby improving reliability. The Clean Energy Development Plan:

1. Aggressively implements the newest as well as "tried and true" energy efficiency technologies.
2. Develops and implements renewable energy technologies, including wind, biomass and solar power, so that they provide 8% of the region's electricity generation by 2010 and 22% by 2020.
3. Develops and implements efficient natural gas uses in appropriate locations, especially combined heat and power (CHP), district energy systems and fuel cells, so that they provide 10% of the region's electricity generation by 2010, and 25% by 2020.
4. Retires selected older, less-efficient and highly polluting coal plants.
5. Applies sustainable development strategies to aggressively link environmental improvement policies to economic development.

As the chart below shows, implementing the Clean Energy Development Plan means:

• Energy efficiency measures reduce electricity demand, and therefore generation.
• Generation from renewable resources and efficient natural gas increases.
• Generation from older, less efficient and highly-polluting coal plants decreases significantly

The Midwest has a tremendous opportunity to use energy in smarter, more efficient ways, thereby reducing pollution, saving money, and creating jobs. This will produce the benefits summarized below.

• Reduces net electricity costs by $5.5 billion by 2020
• Saves 290 TWh of electricity - equal to about 100 large power plants -- by 2020
• Reduces electricity demand 17 percent by 2010 and 28 percent by 2020
• Costs less -at an average cost of 2.3 ¢/kWh - than generating, transmitting and distributing electricity
• Spurs job growth in efficiency industries and promote economic development

Deploying Renewable Resources and Efficient Generation

The Midwest has a tremendous opportunity to harness abundant renewable resources that provide environmental benefits, enhanced reliability, and job creation in the growing renewable energy business sector. The Midwest can also develop efficient generators using natural gas, such as CHP. All together, the opportunities shown in Figure 3 could supply roughly 18 percent of the region's generation capacity by 2010 and 46 percent by 2020.