The Lansing Board of Water and Light's Eckert plant is a city trademark, but new emissions standards could close the 55-year-old plant.

"The new mercury standards are forcing us to close several of our Eckert units, our downtown units," BWL General Manager Peter Lark said.

Couple that will increasing numbers...

"Over the next 10 or 20 years we should grow by approximately 1.4 percent a year," he said.

And you have a dilemma.

"We have to build a new plant," Lark said.

So the BWL is proposing to build a new billion dollar hybrid plant in Delta Township - to be paid for by bonds and rate increases.

"Will rates go up as a result? Yes," Lark said. "But if we don't build a plant? It would be a lot more."

The proposed plant would be built right next to the Erickson plant on Canal Road. Though it would be coal-based, one-third of the power created will come from biomass fuels.

"It would be wood, parts of corn," Lark said. "Those are the renewable sources we plant to use."

But Anne Woiwode, director of the Sierra Club in Michigan, said it's still a coal plant.

"There's no need for us to be burning anymore coal in this state," Woiwode said. "There's no need for us to build anymore dirty plants in Michigan, period."

But BWL's general manager said this new plant will not be like any other.

"We are trying to build a plant that will be significantly greener and leave a smaller carbon footprint," he said.

The BWL is planning to file for a permit with the Department of Environmental quality by the end of this year.