Gary L. Rainwater

Gary L. Rainwater has been president and chief executive officer of Ameren since January 2004. Prior to taking on the title of CEO, Rainwater had served as Ameren's president and chief operating officer since 2001. Rainwater joined Union Electric Company, which is now the Ameren utility company AmerenUE, in 1979.

In 2005, Ameren operated 63 coal-fired generating units with total capacity of 10,719 megawatts.

Affiliations
Rainwater is on the boards of the Edison Electric Institute, the Association of Edison Illuminating Companies, the St. Louis Regional Commerce and Growth Association, Civic Progress, the Missouri Historical Society, the St. Louis USO, the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis, and US Bank.

Compensation
In May 2007, Forbes listed Rainwater as receiving $1.44 million in total compensation for the latest fiscal year, with a three-year total compensation of $5.7 million. He ranked 39th on the list of CEOs in the Utilities industry, and 462nd among all CEOs in the United States.

Existing coal-fired power plants
Ameren is the fifth highest producer of coal-fired energy in the U.S. The company had 31 coal-fired generating stations in 2005, with 10,719 MW of capacity. Here is a list of Ameren's coal power plants with capacity over 100 MW:

In 2005, Ameren's 11 coal-fired power plants emitted 69.6 million tons of CO2 (1.2% of all U.S. CO2 emissions) and at least 261,000 tons of SO2 (1.7% of all U.S. SO2 emissions).

Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Ameren coal plants
In 2010, Abt Associates issued a study commissioned by the Clean Air Task Force, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, quantifying the deaths and other health effects attributable to fine particle pollution from coal-fired power plants. Fine particle pollution consists of a complex mixture of soot, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. Among these particles, the most dangerous are those less than 2.5 microns in diameter, which are so tiny that they can evade the lung's natural defenses, enter the bloodstream, and be transported to vital organs. Impacts are especially severe among the elderly, children, and those with respiratory disease. The study found that over 13,000 deaths and tens of thousands of cases of chronic bronchitis, acute bronchitis, asthma, congestive heart failure, acute myocardial infarction, dysrhythmia, ischemic heart disease, chronic lung disease, and pneumonia each year are attributable to fine particle pollution from U.S. coal plant emissions. These deaths and illnesses are major examples of coal's external costs, i.e. uncompensated harms inflicted upon the public at large. Low-income and minority populations are disproportionately impacted as well, due to the tendency of companies to avoid locating power plants upwind of affluent communities. To monetize the health impact of fine particle pollution from each coal plant, Abt assigned a value of $7,300,000 to each 2010 mortality, based on a range of government and private studies. Valuations of illnesses ranged from $52 for an asthma episode to $440,000 for a case of chronic bronchitis.

Table 1: Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Ameren coal plants
Source: "Health Impacts - annual - of Existing Plants," Clean Air Task Force Excel worksheet, available under "Data Annex" at "Death and Disease from Power Plants," Clean Air Task Force. Note: This data includes the following plants owned by Ameren and affiliates AmerenEU and Central Illinois Light Co.: Coffeen, Meredosia, Newton, Labadie, Meramec, Sioux, Rush Island, E.D. Edwards, and Duck Creek.

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