A Push to Go Green
While West Virginia works toward the creation of the Ap-
palachia Storage and Trading Hub and restarting its various
pipeline projects, the threat of additional environmental regu-
lations is always looming. However, Wood believes the state’s
change in focus from coal to natural gas has softened the en-
vironmental community’s gaze for the moment.
“I don’t know if we’ll see more regulations on carbon emis-
sions from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),” he
says. “It seems the environmental community is waiting to see
how natural gas might be a transition fuel away from coal, so
why should it impede the growth of natural gas-powered plants?
The reduction in CO 2 emissions from the U.S. over just the
past four years has been dramatic. There is a lot of data on it.
Some of it is conflicting data, but all the data says it’s down.”
While the EPA may continue to dole out regulations and
the WVU Energy Institute continues working hard to find
creative ways to reduce CO 2 emissions, Wood believes it will
ultimately be the investing public that pushes the hardest for
a more responsible emissions economy.
“Consumers are pushing hard on utility corporate manage-
ment and utility boards of directors to be greener and produce
less carbon emissions,” he says. “While utilities need reliabil-
ity and safety—these are their primary issues—they are also
responding to this push in big ways. We have relationships
through CERC, including domestic utilities, and we know
leadership is working hard to make their companies carbon
free by 2025-2040. That is an amazing change. It is not a
change made by government mandate—this is the consuming
and investing public telling management they want clean
energy. I think it’s an amazing turnabout from days gone by
when those decisions would go to a public service commission
and be debated forever and eventually some decisions would
be made. Because much of U.S. energy is independent and less
regulated, the utilities are free to do this on their own and make
decisions they think are in the best interest of their owners
and consumers, and they’ve gone to great lengths to do this.”
While WVU may eventually begin the search for a new full-
time director of its energy institute, Wood is more than happy
to stay and continue his diligent work for the betterment of
the Mountain State.
“WVU is an R1 research institute—the highest category of
these type of institutions in the U.S.,” he says. “We intend to
use the energy institute to strengthen the research capabilities
of WVU and produce value-added, outcome-based research
in the energy field.”
The first lab of the Marcellus Shale Energy
and Environment Laboratory in Westover, WV.
Photo by West Virginia University.
West Virginia Workers
Producing
West Virginia Energy
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