Duke Energy's clean coal gasification electric power project under construction in southwest Indiana will receive approximately $1 million in federal funds to study the permanent storage of carbon dioxide from the plant near the site.

The U.S. Department of Energy announced funding this week for a number of projects across the nation to determine if large quantities of carbon can be permanently stored deep underground instead of being released into the atmosphere.

The DOE funds come from the Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership Program, which addresses climate change by encouraging technology that reduces carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere from fossil fuel-fired processes.

Duke Energy's funds are part of a $61 million grant to the Midwest Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership, a collaborating network of more than 35 members that includes eight states, state geologdic surveys, universities, non-governmental organizations, state government organizations and many of the leading energy companies operating in the region. The partnership is led by Columbus, Ohio-based Battelle.

"We think that greenhouse gases will be regulated, and coal gasification plants with carbon capture and sequestration technology hold tremendous promise to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and help address global climate change," said Duke Energy Indiana President Jim Stanley. "Our goal is to make this one of the nation's first demonstrations of capture and sequestration of carbon dioxide from a power plant."

The approximately 630-megawatt plant will use advanced integrated gasification combined cycle technology. The new plant will produce 10 times as much power as the existing plant at Edwardsport, yet it will emit less sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and mercury than the plant it replaces.

Due to the plant's superior efficiency, it also will emit 45 percent less carbon dioxide per megawatt-hour than the existing facility.

Duke Energy selected an existing power plant site in Edwardsport for the project. The company will retire the existing plant -- with coal and oil units built between 1944 and 1951 -- upon completion of the new facility.

Construction of the plant will help modernize Duke's Indiana generating fleet.

Duke Energy's Indiana operations provide approximately 7,300 megawatts of s electricity to more than 780,000 customers.

making it the state's largest electric supplier.

Duke Energy, one of the largest electric power companies in the United States, supplies and delivers electricity to approximately 4 million U.S. customers in its regulated jurisdictions. The company has approximately 35,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity in the Midwest and the Carolinas, and natural gas distribution services in Ohio and Kentucky. In addition, Duke Energy has more than 4,000 megawatts of electric generation in Latin America, and is a joint-venture partner in a U.S. real estate company.

Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Duke Energy is a Fortune 500 company traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol DUK. More information about the company is available on the Internet at: www.duke-energy.com.