Tennessee Valley Authority has released the draft of the 2025 Integrated Resource Plan to gauge the next 25 years of energy sources. The main goal of the IRP is to become carbon-free by 2050. Accompanying this draft plan is the draft Environmental Impact Statement, a document that details every scenario regarding its impact on our planet.

As of now, the IRP is under review with the stakeholders as well as the public. TVA encourages the public to voice their concerns. The University of Tennessee students are allowed to voice their opinions because they are directly affected by the decisions that TVA makes about moving forward with energy.

Since 2005, TVA has reduced carbon — the most potent greenhouse gas — emissions by 58% and hopes to reduce emissions by 80% in 2035. Fifty-five percent of energy sources run by TVA come from carbon-free sources such as wind, solar, nuclear and hydropower. The remaining percentage of energy comes from the remaining coal plants still in operation and natural gas plants — releasing methane gas, the second most potent greenhouse gas.

The draft IRP is 262 pages long, but it has been condensed into a 14-page document — known as the executive summary — which makes it easier for the public to read.

Appalachian Voices — founded in 1997 — “brings people together to protect the land, air and water of Central and Southern Appalachia and advance a just transition to a generative and equitable clean energy economy,” according to a statement on their website.

This activist group has been calling on TVA to create a cleaner energy system. Not only does this mean strictly using renewable energy, but it also means supplying jobs for the community with the loss of coal plants.

Leah McCord, a member of Appalachian Voices, discussed the IRP and what it could mean for communities directly engaged with TVA.

“They have nine methane gas plants — two of which are already under construction, so seven still left to be constructed — planned for the next decade,” McCord said. “That’s the largest methane gas build-out in the country.”

While natural gas plants release mainly methane gas, there is still a small amount of carbon being released into the atmosphere. These plants have a life cycle of 30 to 40 years, posing a risk to the statement made by TVA to become carbon-free by 2050.

Scott Brooks, a public relations staff member at TVA, goes into detail about what this plan could look like.

“If we were to turn off everything except renewable energy, we’d be sitting in the dark for six to eight hours a day,” Brooks said. “The technology on the utility scale is not there right now to make it reliable 24/7 or resilient when you need it.”

Although the plants will be constructed for at least two out of the seven, there is no guarantee that they will run their whole life cycle.

“Once they’re built, if they’re not running, they’re just being maintained,” Brooks said.

The draft IRP can only predict the future, but activists like Appalachian Voices demand that TVA become more transparent with the public. At the August board meeting in Alabama, board member Michelle Moore voiced her opinion on the lack of transparency the public has been asking for, ultimately denying her vote for the presented budget resolution.

“We have nine seats on the board, nine people we expect to bring their own opinions to the process. We absolutely respect the varied opinions of these board members, most of (whom) have expertise in business or energy. … They were nominated for a reason,” Brooks said.

TVA encourages the public to read the draft IRP so that they can make comments to TVA at any upcoming public meeting. Until Nov. 27, the public has the opportunity to make these comments, positive or negative, to show that they care about how TVA is affecting the environment.

“I think a lot of times probably TVA and people who support TVA feel like we are anti-TVA, and that couldn’t be further from the truth,” McCord said. “We believe in the mission of TVA so deeply that we expect them to be better than they are currently. … Its logo is for all the people, and we want that to be true.”