TVA executives among nominees
TVA's outgoing CEO and a former TVA executive who is among those being considered to head TVA are finalists in the prestigious Platts Global Energy Awards for the industry's top CEOs.
Platts, an energy industry publication, has nominated 12 industry leaders for its Vision and Leadership award for 2012, including TVA CEO Tom Kilgore and PJM Interconnection CEO Terry Boston.
Kilgore plans to retire once his successor is chosen and the TVA board is reviewing applicants for the top job at the nation's biggest government utility.
One candidate for the job is Boston, the head of PJM who previously headed TVA's transmission organization and still owns a home on Signal Mountain.
Winners of the 2012 Global Energy Awards will be announced at a black-tie celebration on Nov. 29 in New York City.
Finalists for the annual CEO honor were chosen from a list of over 200 nominations.
Other CEOs nominated for the top honor include U.S. Navy Secretary Stephen Wright, Southern Co. CEO Tom Fanning and Samsung Engineering CEO Ki Seok Park.
College adds diploma program
Chattanooga College Medical, Dental and Technical Careers has added a cosmetology diploma program to its list of course offerings.
The course offers hands-on cosmetology training in Chattanooga at the Eastgate Town Center campus. The college and the program are approved by Tennessee Higher Education Council and accredited by Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges.
The program gives students the opportunity to work on actual customers in the attached salon, Shear Elegance Salon. Instructors will teach a variety of techniques for haircutting, hair shaping and color processes, also including the art of facials, manicures and pedicures.
Students enrolled in the new cosmetology diploma program will earn 1,500 clock hours over a 12- to 18-month period. Cosmetology courses at Chattanooga College will begin on Monday. Day cosmetology students will be attending class eight hours per day Monday through Thursday.
Evening students will attend for four hours per day Monday through Thursday.
3 groups fight mountain mining
Three environmental groups are challenging a state permit for a mountaintop removal mining operation in East Tennessee.
The Sierra Club, Statewide Organizing for Community eMpowerment and the Tennessee Clean Water Network filed an administrative appeal last week with state environmental regulators.
The petition says the permit from the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation allows greater pollution into streams and less stringent monitoring than is required by federal clean water laws.
The Zeb Mountain mining site in Campbell and Scott counties is operated by National Coal. It is the largest mountaintop mining site in Tennessee.
It's the second permit TDEC has issued for the site because the company challenged the previous one.
The environmental groups say the second permit is weaker and allows more pollution from selenium and other harmful materials.
Banker sees bleak future
The former chairman for one of the South's biggest banks expects the U.S. economy will face an even bigger financial crisis than the recession in the next 13 years unless government promises and spending are brought under control.
In the annual Burkett Miller economic lecture at UTC last week, former BB&T Chairman John Alison said government deficits and spending are on an unsustainable path that will bring the nation to its economic knees by 2025.
"If we don't change direction and continue with our altruistic, free lunch mentality, the United States faces an economic disaster in 2025," Alison told nearly 200 student and faculty members.
Alison said the unfunded liability for Social Security, Medicare, Obamacare and government pensions totals more than $100 trillion.
"That isn't politics, that's math," the conservative economist said.
Alison said the United States has about seven or eight years to change direction or face a bleak economic future.