MidAmerican Energy Co. officials say the utility has moved swiftly to shift away from some coal production, despite environmental groups’ contention this week that the Warren Buffett-owned company isn’t moving quickly enough.

“MidAmerican Energy’s track record in renewable energy speaks for itself,” the company said in a statement in response to a Business Record question. “We built our first wind farm in 2004 and have aggressively pursued wind energy ever since. Since 2003, harnessing wind energy has enabled us to cut our carbon intensity in half, and that will only increase as we continue to add to our wind fleet.

“MidAmerican Energy has retired coal units in the last several years, including Walter Scott Jr. Units 1 and 2 and Neal Energy Center Units 1 and 2. Additionally, of the coal units that we operate today, all are equipped with the full suite of environmental controls as we continue to minimize the environmental footprint of every asset in our portfolio. 

“The bottom line is our carbon intensity is decreasing and our wind generation capacity is expanding.” 

MidAmerican noted that it plans to become the first investor-owned electric utility to generate renewable energy equal to 100 percent of customers’ usage on an annual basis, part of its effort provide low-cost power while reducing air pollution.

Generation fueled by natural gas, nuclear and coal-fueled plants makes electric service more reliable when winds are low, the utility added.