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St. Louis Post-Dispatch

900 North Tucker Boulevard
St. Louis, Mo. 63101

E-mail: bizbulletin@post-dispatch.com

Phone: 314-340-8345

Fax: 314-340-3060

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The Clydesdales might appear in Super Bowl XLIV after all, according to the brewer of Budweiser, which is reconsidering an ad with the iconic horses after putting them on the bench for the championship game.

The original 30-second Clydesdale ad was shelved after it failed to impress a group of test viewers, according to Anheuser-Busch (BUD). But the brewer is taking another look at the ad, after a re-editing it to a longer, 60-second version.

"We filmed the Clydesdales ad with the intention of running it in the game, but the first edit didn’t turn out the way we wanted," said an Anheuser-Busch spokesperson. "The 60-second version allows for a better story to be told. We really liked the edit, so we decided to throw it back in the ring."

However, there is no guarantee that the draft horses will be making an appearance during the game, according to the brewer.

Instead, Anheuser-Busch was posting the 60-second ad Friday on its Facebook page, where it will run alongside other ads that are being considered for the Super Bowl. The company will take consumer feedback into consideration when it decides which ads will run during the game, according to the spokesperson.

Anheuser-Busch, the Super Bowl’s exclusive beer advertiser for 22 years, has bought 5 minutes worth of ads this year for Budweiser, Bud Light, Bud Select 55 and Michelob Ultra, making it the top advertiser.

CBS (CBS, Fortune 500), the broadcaster for this year’s game, said it is charging up to $3 million for 30-second spots. Neither CBS nor Anheuser-Busch has identified the cost of the 5 minutes.

The Clydesdales have served for decades as the face of Budweiser products — not only in televised ads, but also in up-close visits at parades and the company-affiliated theme parks in Florida and Virginia.

Clydesdale ads featured prominently in the 2009 Super Bowl. An ad about a love affair between a Clydesdale and a circus horse scored high marks with viewers in a USA Today poll.

This year’s Super Bowl, between the Indianapolis Colts and the New Orleans Saints, will be played Feb. 7 at Sun Life Stadium near Miami. The facility in Miami Gardens, Fla., formerly called Dolphin Stadium, was recently renamed. 

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Japan’s industrial production rose and unemployment fell in December, driven by a rebound in exports that’s now threatened by an appreciating currency.

Factory output increased 2.2 percent from the previous month, less than economists had projected, Trade Ministry figures showed today in Tokyo. The unemployment rate dropped to 5.1 percent from 5.2 percent, according to a separate release.

Declines in consumer prices and the yen’s 8 percent climb in the past nine months are forcing policy makers to remain open to further stimulus even as companies from NEC Corp. to Canon Inc. report earnings improvements. The Bank of Japan highlighted concern the yen’s rise to a 14-year high would undermine business sentiment, minutes of their meetings showed today.

“This confirms that the worst is over,” said Masamichi Adachi, senior economist at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in Tokyo. “But these are very, very small improvements, and the jobs recovery ahead is going to be extremely slow, too.”

Bond futures rose, headed for a three-week advance, as the evidence of continued deflation underpinned demand for the relative safety of government debt. Yields on benchmark 10-year bonds advanced to 1.315 percent after earlier reaching 1.305 percent, the lowest since Jan. 4. The yen fell to 89.96 per dollar.

‘Severe’

“There are signs that the economy is picking up, but this is far from a self-sustained recovery,” Kan said at a gathering of regional Finance Ministry chiefs in Tokyo today. “Employment conditions are severe.”

A separate government report today showed household spending rose 2.1 percent in December from a year before, more than forecast and capping a fifth straight advance. The figures contrasted with data earlier this week showing retail sales tumbled 0.3 percent from a year ago.

The economy added 130,000 jobs in December, the biggest increase in four months. People found more work in medical, welfare and education sectors, while there were fewer jobs and manufacturing and retail industries, according to unadjusted figures in the report.

Canon, based in Tokyo, this week forecast its biggest annual profit increase in a decade as the global recovery revives demand for cameras and office equipment. NEC, Japan’s largest maker of personal computers, posted a narrower loss in the third quarter after cutting costs.

“Unemployment has improved a little bit but I don’t think we can be optimistic at all because the number is still more than 5 percent,” Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama told reporters today in Tokyo. “The situation remains where many people want to work but cannot find a job.”

Stimulus Package

Japan’s Diet yesterday approved a 7.2 trillion yen ($80 billion) economic package aimed at bolstering the recovery from the nation’s worst postwar recession.

“At least the worst is over,” said Yoshiki Shinke, senior economist at Dai-Ichi Life Research Institute in Tokyo. “But I’m concerned unemployment is going to stay stuck at this high level for some time.”

Some companies are still slashing jobs to rein in costs. Promise Co., Japan’s second-largest consumer lender, said yesterday it will cut 1,600 staff, or a third of its workforce, by the end of March 2011. The Tokyo-based company’s net income slumped 23 percent in the six months ended Sept. 30. Japan Airlines Corp., which filed for bankruptcy this month, will slash about 15,700 jobs by the end of March 2013.

The job-to-applicant ratio rose for a fourth month to 0.46, meaning there are 46 positions for every 100 candidates, the Labor Ministry said today. The same report showed there were 87 newly advertised jobs in December for every 100 people who started looking for work that month, the most since January. Economists regard the gauge as a leading indicator of employment.

Export Recovery

Exports rose for the first time in 15 months in December, fueling production gains and may also be encouraging companies to increase overtime or hiring. Toyota Motor Corp. and Sumitomo Pipe & Tube Co. are among companies increasing production to meet growing demand in China.

Toyota, Nissan Motor Co. and Honda Motor Co. increased global production in December as automobile demand surged in China and U.S. sales recovered. Output at Toyota rose 33 percent from a year earlier, while Honda increased production 3.4 percent and Nissan’s surged 54 percent.

The manufacturers plan to increase production 1.3 percent this month and 0.3 percent in February, the government said today.

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The Phoenix Suns are discounting upper-level tickets for Tuesday night’s game against the Charlotte Bobcats at US Airways Center in downtown Phoenix as attendance continues to lag.

The tickets were being sold Monday for $10. Regular upper-level ticket prices range up to $50.

The Suns are averaging 17,309 fans per game this season, according to ESPN. That is down from last season’s string of sellouts at the 18,400-seat arena.

The Suns are in seventh place in the National Basketball Association’s Western Conference payday loans in one hour. The top eight teams make the playoffs.

The Suns, Phoenix Coyotes and Cactus League baseball have been competing for fans in the tough economy, and all hope to see a boost now that the Arizona Cardinals’ playoff run is over.

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Paul Volcker didn’t lose confidence when the Obama administration initially cast aside his argument to separate banking from trading in its plan for a new financial-regulatory system.

“I’m sure he’ll recognize the wisdom of my view sooner or later,” Volcker said an interview with Bloomberg Television last April, referring to Lawrence Summers, President Barack Obama’s chief economic adviser.

Volcker was vindicated yesterday when Obama proposed limiting trading activities of financial institutions to prevent another crisis, adopting recommendations of the 82- year-old former Federal Reserve chairman. Obama called it the “Volcker Rule.”

“This represents somewhat of a shift from the positions of those in the administration in favor of deregulation,” said Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate and frequent critic of the administration. “Volcker has been pushing for this for a year, and it was one of my biggest disappointments that his idea wasn’t picked up by decision-makers until now.”

As recently as last month, Volcker was still telling friends that he couldn’t get the White House to come around to his view, said two people who have discussed the matter with him. Then in late December Obama decided to take his advice, even with continued opposition from some within the administration, the two people said.

The 6-foot, 7-inch Volcker has always been sure of himself because “he’s a man of utter conviction and absolute integrity,” said Gerald Corrigan, a former Fed colleague and longtime friend. Even as he lost some of his sway, Volcker pressed on, imploring members of the Economic Club of New York last week to help overcome “heavy lobbying on the other side.”

Hunger for Reform

“Volcker has prevailed because there’s still hunger for some sort of reform,” said Marina Whitman, a member of the Group of 30 chaired by Volcker, which made the original recommendation in 2008.

Although Volcker was in Obama’s circle of economic advisers early on during the election campaign, he lost much of his influence when the newly elected president chose Summers as the head of his National Economic Council. Summers was Treasury secretary in President Bill Clinton’s administration when the Glass-Steagall Act requiring the separation of consumer banking and institutions involved in capital markets was repealed.

Volcker was asked to head the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, which brought together business executives to come up with solutions to the economic crisis.

Pushing His Ideas

He pushed for his ideas, complaining when the startup of the advisory board was delayed and getting face-to-face meetings with Obama more than a dozen times to make his case in areas ranging from financial regulation to tax reform fast cash now.

A senior administration official briefing reporters yesterday said Volcker had discussions with Obama, Summers and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. While acknowledging Volcker’s key role in the president’s proposal, the official said all the administration officials were in agreement on the plan the president announced yesterday.

Volcker grew up in Teaneck, New Jersey, during the Great Depression and adopted his parents’ frugality. Last spring, when he ran out of handkerchiefs on a trip to Washington, he bought the cheapest brand he could find at Macy’s — at three for $11, his daughter, Janice Volcker Zima, said in a June interview with Bloomberg News.

Inflation Fighter

His six-decade career included a stint at the U.S. Treasury, where in 1973 he witnessed the collapse of the Bretton Woods System that governed financial relations among nations. Yet he’s best known for his fight against inflation. When he was Fed chairman from 1979 to 1987, he forced inflation down to 1 percent from 15 percent by pushing the fed funds rate up to 20 percent.

He also stood up to Wall Street then. During the Latin American debt crisis, the then Fed chairman arm-twisted the largest U.S. banks to restructure their loans.

After leading the Fed, his roles included digging into Swiss bank accounts in the late 1990s to find the money owed to thousands of Holocaust victims. He tried to save Arthur Andersen LLP from collapsing with a restructuring plan in 2002. And he exposed corruption in the United Nations oil-for-food program in 2005.

Criticizing the Administration

In his current role, after the presidential advisory board got on track and he felt he was being heard, Volcker remained out of the limelight for four months.

That changed in September, when he began a series of public appearances where he criticized the administration’s and Congress’s proposed regulatory changes for financial institutions as too soft, labeling them “reform light.”

In his Jan. 14 speech to the Economic Club of New York, Volcker called for those in attendance to help him fight for stronger regulation.

“If you agree, make your voices heard somehow or another,” he told more than 500 people gathered for lunch at the ballroom of the Grand Hyatt Hotel.

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Oil slipped to $78 a barrel on Friday on warmer weather and as stocks retreated.

What prices are doing: Crude oil fell $1.39 to settle at $78 a barrel after diving as low as $77.70 earlier, marking the fifth day of retreats. Oil prices have dropped over 5% this week.

On Thursday, oil fell 26 cents to $79.39 a barrel as the cold snap ended across much of the country.

What’s driving prices: Stocks lost ground Friday despite better-than-expected earnings reports from JPMorgan Chase and Intel.

Investors are worried that companies such as JPMorgan Chase and Intel may be overvalued, said Chris Lafakis, an associate economist at Moody’s Economy.com.

Similarly, the gains oil made last week could only last so long, he said.

"People feel that prices and stock might have advanced to much," he said. "There’s that same sense with oil — maybe we’re moving too far, too fast."

Prices were also affected by warmer weather since demand for heating fuel declines as temperatures rise, said Lafakis.

"Temperatures have warmed up a little bit across the eastern U.S. and in the midwest," he said. "We use a lot of heating oil to get by in the winter, so a 10 to 15 degree increase will suppress the need for heat."

Earlier, prices were also pressured by a stronger dollar, which was rising against the euro and the pound as investors sought a safe haven.

What analysts are saying: "I think the oil bubble is burst right now, we’re over-done and too high-priced," said Dan Flynn, an energy trader at PFG Best..

Looking ahead, Flynn expects oil to fall significantly, and he said prices could drop as low as $40 within the next week.

"It has been range-bound, but crude oil could lose some premium," he said. "Once it reaches a plateau at $40, then we could probably start to see it rise." 

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Overland-based Vertegy, a design consulting firm, has helped two government facilities earn LEED certification as energy-efficient and environmentally friendly.

The U.S. Green Building Council recently notified Vertegy that the Social Security Administration Building in St. Peters was awarded LEED Silver certification.

Vertegy, who served as LEED consultant, worked with LePique and Orne Architects Inc. and Blanton Construction Co. to incorporate environmentally-sustainable designs in the 9,400-square-foot building. Elements included dual-flush water closets, water-free urinals and a high-efficiency irrigation system need a personal loan with bad credit.

The council also notified Vertegy that the Suffolk Health and Human Services Building, in Suffolk, Va., was awarded Silver certification.
The two buildings bring to 21 the total of LEED-certified developments for which Vertegy has provided consulting or other services.

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Greek bonds fell after the European Commission said there have been “severe irregularities” in the nation’s statistical data, leaving the accuracy of the European Union’s largest budget deficit in doubt.

The declines drove the yield on Greece’s two-year note 16 basis points higher, the most in almost a month, after the commission said in a report today “the lack of reliability and the shortage of evidence supporting the deficit figure reported” in two revisions by the government in April and October left the data “in question.” An International Monetary Fund team arrived in Greece today to aid the government in its efforts to tame the deficit.

“You have all these stories about the IMF visiting Greece, the European Commission and a reversal in risk appetite” hurting bonds, said Peter Schaffrik, an interest-rate strategist at Commerzbank AG in London. “A combination of these factors will weigh on Greece.”

The EU is stepping up scrutiny of Prime Minister George Papandreou’s efforts to tame a deficit forecast to be equivalent to 12.7 percent of the country’s gross domestic product this year, more than four times the region’s set limit. EU President Herman van Rompuy will hold talks with Papandreou today, a week after an EU team spent three days in Athens.

“Unless the institutional weaknesses identified in this report are addressed and proper checks and balances introduced, the reliability of Greek deficit and debt data will remain in question,” the EU said in its report today.

Yield Premium

The declines for Greek bonds drove up the extra yield investors demand to hold the country’s 10-year notes instead of similar-maturity German bonds, the benchmark European securities, by 14 basis points to 232, the highest since Jan. 4. The difference averaged 55 basis points over the past 10 years.

Credit-default swaps on Greece rose 20.5 basis points to 276, according to CMA DataVision prices. That means it costs $276,000 a year to protect $10 million of the government’s debt from default for five years.

Papandreou’s government will complete this week a new deficit-reduction plan that aims to cut the shortfall to within the EU’s 3 percent limit in 2012 and avoid punishment under the EU’s excessive-deficit procedure. The plan will be presented to the Brussels-based commission this month and European finance ministers will rule on the measures at a meeting on Feb. 15-16.

Today’s report marks the EU’s latest challenge to Greek statistical data, after revisions in 2004 indicated the country shouldn’t have qualified to join the euro. Greece has met the EU’s deficit target once since joining the euro, according to Commission figures in November. That was in 2006, when the shortfall was 2.9 percent.

Earlier Revisions

“The most recent revisions are an illustration of the lack of quality of the Greek fiscal statistics and of Greek macroeconomic statistics in general and show that the progress in the compilation of fiscal statistics in the country, and the intense scrutiny by Eurostat since 2004, have not sufficed to bring the quality of Greek fiscal data to the level reached by other EU Member States,” the report said.

Concern about the government’s worsening finances prompted Fitch Ratings, Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s to all cut the country’s creditworthiness in December and fueled investor concern about a possible debt default.

The difference in yield between Greek and German 10-year government debt widened to 276 basis points on Dec. 21, the most since March 17.

Greece’s deficit has prompted speculation from some investors that the rest of the EU would save the country from default if such a move were necessary. The EU will support Greece’s efforts to tame the deficit, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who holds the EU’s rotating presidency, said last week in Brussels.

How far support from the EU or ECB would go remains unclear. ECB Executive Board member Juergen Stark said in a Jan. 6 interview in Italian newspaper Il Sole-24 Ore that “markets are deluding themselves” if they are counting on a bailout.

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An exodus of discouraged workers from the job market kept the U.S. unemployment rate from climbing above 10 percent in December, economists said.

Had the labor force not decreased by 661,000 last month, the jobless rate would have been 10.4 percent, say economists including David Rosenberg at Gluskin Sheff & Associates in Toronto and Harm Bandholz at UniCredit Research in New York.

“The actual unemployment rate is higher than shown by the official numbers,” Bandholz said.

About 1.7 million Americans opted out of the workforce from July through December, representing a 1.1 percent drop that marks the biggest six-month decrease since 1961, figures from the Labor Department showed today in Washington. The share of the population in the labor force last month fell to the lowest level in 24 years.

December’s 10 percent unemployment rate was unchanged from the previous month, matching the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. It was shy of the 26-year high of 10.1 percent reached two months earlier.

The so-called underemployment rate — which includes part- time workers who’d prefer a full-time position and people who want work but have given up looking — rose to 17.3 percent in December from 17.2 percent, today’s report showed.

The number of discouraged workers, those not looking for work because they believe none is available, climbed to 929,000 last month, the most since records began in 1994.

Length of Unemployment

The backdrop to the disillusionment is that it’s taking longer and longer to find work, economists said. Workers were unemployed for 29.1 weeks on average last month, the most since records began in 1948.

“Longer-term unemployment is one of the biggest problems,” said Bandholz. “Payroll declines will come to a halt in the next couple of months, but the people who are unemployed are having problems getting a job and it’s getting tougher by the month.”

The U.S. unexpectedly lost another 85,000 jobs in December after revised figures showed payrolls climbed by 4,000 the month before, today’s report from the Labor Department showed. The November gain was the first since the economic slump began in December 2007.

“Workers seem to be particularly discouraged by this recession,” said Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd instant payday loans completely online. in New York.

Participation Rate

The participation rate, or the share of the population in the labor force, fell to 64.6 percent in December, the lowest level since 1985, from 64.9 percent.

The labor force will probably grow this year as the economy continues to expand and Americans believe jobs will be easier to get. That will mean the unemployment rate will head higher because there won’t be enough jobs available to satisfy the demand for work.

“The exodus from the labor force can’t contain the unemployment rate indefinitely,” said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody’s Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania. “We expect unemployment to resume rising over the next few months, peaking near 10.5 percent in the third quarter.”

Federal Reserve policy makers, while noting stabilization in the labor market, have expressed concern about unemployment and poor job prospects. That’s one reason policy makers will keep the benchmark interest rate near zero longer than most anticipate, said John Ryding.

Fed ‘On Hold’

“We continue to believe that the Fed will leave monetary policy on hold throughout 2010 in light of the high level of un- and under-utilized labor resources,” Ryding, chief economist at RDQ Economics in New York, said in a note to clients. The median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News last month projected the first rate increase would come in the third quarter of this year.

Treasury two-year notes today gained the most in three weeks following the worse-than-expected payroll numbers. The notes’ yields dropped below 1 percent.

President Barack Obama on Dec. 8 proposed additional spending on the nation’s transportation system, tax credits to spur hiring by small businesses and incentives to make homes more energy efficient in a second round of efforts to cut the jobless rate.

“We’re going to have to work harder to create jobs.” U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said in an interview today on Bloomberg Television. “This is a very stubborn recession.”

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MARISSA, Ill. — On a clear December morning, drivers traveling south on state Route 4 in southwest Illinois can see the Prairie State Energy Campus’ stack rising 700 feet above the surrounding corn fields — 70 feet taller than the Gateway Arch.

The scope of project is even more striking once on site. The hulking plant will consume more than 50,000 tons of structural steel, 15,000 tons of steel rebar and 160,000 cubic yards of concrete. It is surrounded by more than a dozen tower cranes, their jibs reaching skyward.

What’s more, the $4 billion project stands as a tangible symbol of the polarizing debate over climate change and the use of coal as an energy source.

Critics argue the plant, which will be the second-largest coal-fired power plant in Illinois, will pump an estimated 10 million tons of carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the atmosphere each year for decades to come at the very time many scientists are urging immediate action to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases.

On the other hand, the project is providing jobs for 2,500 people — a fact that’s evident by the sea of cars and pickups sprawled across two massive parking lots on site.

The 1,600-megawatt plant will employ an additional 500 people when it’s complete, and provide electricity to as many as 2.5 million people across nine states, including parts of Illinois and Missouri. There are indirect jobs created too, with restaurants, hotels and shops getting a pick-me-up — a point not lost on those who live in the area.

In nearby Marissa, a small town just southwest of the plant site, the surge of construction workers has been a boon for restaurants and retailers as they coped with the recession, said Ray Macke, township supervisor. And most rental property owners have had an easy time finding tenants.

"It’s had a very positive impact, business-wise," Macke said. "We’re not taking nearly the hit the other places are."

Macke is sensitive to the widely differing views on global warming and the use of coal as an electricity fuel. But, most of the town’s 2,000 or so residents are happy to see the project, save for some aggravation with the increase in truck traffic.

After all, Marissa’s heritage is linked with the local mining industry and still hosts the Coal Fest every summer.

"This town wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for coal mining," he said.

GREEN CONCERNS

Prairie State was announced in 2001 and was supposed to be generating electricity by 2007. But the legal battle surrounding the plant’s air permit wasn’t resolved until late 2006 when the Environmental Appeals Board affirmed an Illinois EPA decision to approve the project.

Prairie State officials say the plant is cleaner than comparable coal power stations and includes the best available environmental controls, including massive scrubbers that will remove most sulfur dioxide from the emissions. Using coal conveyed from an adjacent mine instead of fuel hauled 1,000 miles by train from northeastern Wyoming will also cut CO2 emissions by 200,000 tons a year, CEO Peter DeQuattro said.

While burning coal releases CO2, the fuel has advantages over renewable forms of electricity. At least for now, there’s a cost advantage compared with wind and solar. And a coal-fueled power plant can produce reliable electricity 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, he said.

"With all due respect to the (global warming) debate and potential for green jobs, if you look at the fundamentals, the country needs affordable base load electric power," DeQuattro said. "It’s the basis for any type of significant employment base and for us as a country to enjoy the economic standards that we do."

The end of the legal and permitting battles did nothing to change feelings and perceptions about the project business card. Surrounding communities and elected officials mostly embraced it. Meanwhile, the project remains anathema to environmental groups, who still believe regulators should have required technology to capture CO2 emissions.

"Peabody built a plant with early 20th century technology while claiming it to be ‘advanced,’" said Kathy Andria, director of the American Bottom Conservancy, one of the groups that battled developer Peabody Energy Corp. over the air permit. She noted that the EPA recently declared that CO2 poses a danger to public health, a step toward federal regulation of greenhouse gases.

JOBS GROWING

The plant and adjacent mine are more than a third complete. Electrons are set to begin flowing in August 2011 when the first 800-megawatt unit is done. The second 800 megawatt unit is scheduled to be complete by June 2012.

The work site swarms with steelworkers, pipefitters and laborers. Another 170 people are at work at the adjacent mine. Virtually overnight, the project site has become one of the larger towns in rural Washington County, just smaller than Nashville, the county seat.

The plant sits on more than 600 acres of 2,400 acres owned by Prairie State Generating LLC. Over the course of a year, it will burn 6.3 million tons of coal from the adjacent mine, which reaches 230 feet underground. The black rock will be transported across County Road 12 by a system of conveyors and delivered to the plant’s boilers.

While the plant won’t begin producing electricity for almost two years, efforts to staff it are well under way.

"We are just getting going" on hiring, DeQuattro said. "We have an initial staff of 14 people at the plant for operations. Construction management staff is over 40."

He said they plan to add this year 75 to 100 jobs this year in operations and over 100 in the mine.

Prairie State partnered with Southwest Illinois College and Illinois Eastern Community Colleges for the mine and co-developed training programs offered by the schools to help prospective employees be able to pass tests that are part of the hiring process. The classes, which began last year, were oversubscribed, so additional times and dates were offered.

"We need to salt the work force with experienced people like we have, but for the nonexempt ranks," DeQuattro said. "We also want to try to hire local people where possible."

St. Louis-based Peabody, the world’s largest private-sector coal company, today owns just a 5 percent stake in Prairie State, having sold the rest of its interest to eight public power systems, each of which not only owns a piece of the plant but also a share of the 200 million tons of coal buried 230 feet below ground (effectively a 45-square mile block of coal).

The ownership group has vocally opposed climate legislation debated by Congress. Meanwhile, Prairie State has hired consultants to study the cost to fit the plant with equipment to capture CO2 emissions, DeQuattro said.

For now, CO2 capture technology hasn’t been installed on coal-fired power plants as large as Prairie State. And the economics of doing so probably don’t make sense right now.

But groups such as the Clean Air Task Force, a Massachusetts-based environmental advocacy group, have become increasingly optimistic that the nation’s existing coal fleet can be fitted with CO2 controls.

"(Prairie State) is the last of the line of these large coal plants," said John Thompson of Carbondale, director of the group’s coal transition program. "My hope is that it will be among the first to retrofit."

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