The Kansas House of Representatives and Senate have approved a compromise bill that would allow the construction of two large coal-fired power plants in southwestern Kansas.

Although House Bill 2014 passed by big majorities in both houses April 3, it faces an uncertain future.

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius has promised to veto the bill. That means both the House and Senate would have to come up with two-thirds majorities to override Sebelius’ veto.

Sebelius has said she’s confident that her veto will stand.
The bill passed the Senate with enough votes to spare, Senate Majority Leader Derek Schmidt said. However, the House approved the coal-plant bill with less than a two-thirds margin.

Indeed, the House vote had fewer votes for the compromise bill than for an earlier version. A senior House Democrat who voted for the compromise House Bill 2014 said he was surprised that the compromise bill lost support. The earlier coal-plant bill was five votes short of the two-thirds mark. The April 3 vote was 10 votes shy. He said he talked to some of those legislators who changed their votes for the compromise and he said they were unhappy that the Republican House leadership had cut them out of the process.

Schmidt said that the legislators who changed their votes were merely sending a message to their leaders and that they didn’t indicate a lack of support for the bill.

The Senate Majority Leader said that when the vetoed bill returns to the Legislature for an override attempt, there will be enough votes in the Senate and that the margin in the House will shrink to two to three votes shy of the two-thirds mark. Schmidt said he doesn’t know if the House leadership can come up with the remaining votes needed to override.

“We have the votes in the Senate but as far as the House, it’s anybody’s guess,” he said.

The Legislature is in recess and will return for its Veto Session at the end of the month.

If the House leaders do come up with the votes, it’s no guarantee that construction on the two power plants will begin anytime soon, Schmidt said.

“I’ve always been hesitant to say that if we pass the bills, we’ll build the plants,” Schmidt said. “The bill will just issue the (air quality) permits. We in the Legislature will not build the plants. That’s up to the utilities. We’re not in the plant-building business.

“We’re in the business of maintaining supervision over the state regulators and to seeing that they comply with the intent of the policymakers.”

Whether the plants get built depends on several other factors, including changes in federal regulation and whether that Sunflower Electric Cooperative, which is seeking the permits to build the plants, could attract the financing from Wall Street, he said.

If legislators fail to override the veto, Schmidt said he figures the bill is dead for this year and probably next year. Although Sebelius will soon likely be sworn in as President Obama’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, her successor, Lt. Gov. Mark Parkinson, has also said he would veto any coal-plant bill, Schmidt said. Any such bill would have to wait on a change in the governorship, he said.
It’s probably more likely that Sunflower will continue the fight in court, he said.

House Bill 2014 would issue air-quality permits to allow Sunflower to build two new 700 megawatt generators next to an existing 360-megawatt power plant at Holcomb in southwestern Kansas. Most of the power from the new plants would go to cooperatives in Texas, Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming. The proposal has been the subject of intense wrangling between legislators and Sebelius over this and last year’s legislative sessions after Rod Bremby, Kansas Secretary of Health and Environment, decided not to issue air-quality permits for the new coal plants because of concerns about air pollution and the impact of the new plants’ “carbon footprint” on climate change. Another controversial part of the bill would limit the ability of the KDHE to regulate power plants. The bill also includes some language that encourages the development of renewable energy sources.