john amos power plant closing john amos power plant closing
that is degrading to another person. It's one of 174 coal-fired plants nationwide that could be impacted by the Supreme Court's decision. After the closure, a series of channels drained the former pond site, connecting to an . I know it can happen, but I just don't think it will happen again.". Curtis Tate/West Virginia Public Broadcasting Listen The nation got the lowest amount of electricity on record from coal in the first three months of the year. Utility customers in West Virginia, Virginia and Kentucky would pay for the cost. It retired its Philip Sporn power plant in Mason County and its Kanawha River Power Plant in Kanawha County in 2015. Mayor Kay Summers of Clendenin, West Virginia, says she's haunted by the historic 2016 flood that nearly wiped out her town but still skeptical of the science around climate change. The rules require power plants to reduce. Appalachian Power is proposing several options including making the pollution control modifications to all three plants or closing Mitchell by 2028 and making the modifications to John Amos. An economic analysis by the Sierra Club comes to a different conclusion: closing the plants could save ratepayers hundreds of millions of dollars. The cost of wind and solar have plummeted in recent years. Charlie Reynolds, a Republican from West Virginias Marshall County, told the commission, referring to the Mitchell Plant. If we instead retired one or both of the plants, we would have to spend billions of dollars on replacement capacity much earlier than necessary. "We are absolutely certain that there's going to be a considerable number of more retirements for this decade," Feaster said. The model predicts one of Mitchells two units would close in two years, and the other in three. The model predicts one of Mitchell's two units would close in two years, and the other in three. Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window), AEP subsidiaries Wheeling Power and Appalachian Power have asked. High 53F. On July 26, meanwhile, the Biden administration initiated a supplemental rulemaking to strengthen certain discharge limits in the ELG rule. But while the SCC moved to approve AEPs recovery of costs related to the federal Coal Combustion and Residuals (CCR). They are also the front line in a landmark environmental case before the U.S. Supreme Court, which will decide this spring how much authority the Environmental Protection Agency has to regulate earth-warming emissions from coal-fired power plants. They plan on retiring another 25 gigawatts through 2025. The $317 million project would change the way the coal plants dispose of coal combustion residuals and wastewater from scrubbers that remove sulfur dioxide from plant emissions. This pond has been capped and was closed at the end of 2017. West Virginia Coal Plants Need Upgrades. Closing the Mitchell plant in 2028 would save $118 million, it found. Editorial: Two power plants' future becomes uncertain. And so it's a tough spot if you own these utilities, he said, so I understand why they're struggling to think about what their options are.. They generated the electricity for homes around the Ohio Valley. It retired its Philip Sporn power plant in Mason County and its Kanawha River Power Plant in Kanawha County in 2015. found several ash sites are leaking potentially hazardous chemicals into groundwater. The West Virginia Public Service Commission must decide in the coming weeks whether to approve an environmental compliance surcharge on electricity customers. Mitchell and Amos began operating in 1971, and Mountaineer in 1980. Our next steps will be to evaluate our options in light of those orders, determine the best path forward to meet the resource needs in each state, and return to the commissions if necessary for consideration of our updated costs and plans, a spokesperson said. Other than in their local communities, the loss of Sporn and Kanawha River were barely noticed. It predicts Mountaineers single unit would shut down in three years. Holladay says his model is mostly accurate, though he noted that the model cant know every specific circumstance surrounding each plant. An email message containing instructions on how to reset your password has been sent to the e-mail address listed on your account. "I have never seen flooding like I've seen here in the past, really in the past 20 years," said longtime environmental activist Maria Gunnoe, whose family has lived and mined in West Virginia for generations. In that report, the examiner recommended that the SCC should approve only recovery of CCR-related costs. Report: AEP Companies' Coal Management Practices Led To Shortages At 3 Still churning electricity to West Virginia and beyond West Virginia is challenging EPA efforts to blunt the impact of climate change. The West Virginia Public Service Commission must decide in the coming weeks whether to approve an environmental compliance surcharge on electricity customers. AEP subsidiaries Wheeling Power and Appalachian Power have asked the state Public Service Commission to approve $317 million to pay for the retrofits to keep the plants operating until 2040. Still, power customers will have to pay those costs whenever the plants shut down. Cheap, abundant natural gas has been eroding coals share of electric power generation for more than a decade. According to direct testimony submitted to the SCC earlier this year by. AEP and other power plant operators are retiring coal-fired plants in the region. For more than four decades, the plant, now Appalachian. PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK. Ohio-based AEP has one other plant among the top 10, the John Amos Plant in West Virginia, which has a generation cost of $39 per megawatt-hour. Close. West Virginia's public utilities commission last year gave the John Amos plant and two other aging coal-fired facilities a new lease on life, approving more than $448 million in environmental upgrades to keep them burning coal until 2040. Inside and outside our model, 2040 is hard to imagine, said Scott Holladay, an associate professor of economics at the University of Tennessee. They plan on retiring another 25 gigawatts through 2025. "Coal and solar have to coexist here.". Last year, AEP said it would shut down or refuel 5.6 GW of its 2020 coal-fired power fleet by 2030 to comply with environmental rulesincluding recent revisions to federal CCR and ELG rulesand rebalance its portfolio in a bid to meet ambitious climate goals. We find it is critically important to analyze the overall impact of this investment on both customer rates and reliability, and that [for this specific expense] the instant record is currently lacking in both regards, the SCC said in its order. Meanwhile, the cost of wind and solar energy has plummeted. , said. Coal-fired plants also produce less power than theyre capable of generating. Had natural gas not become so plentiful and inexpensive, one or both might still be operating. The lower output means fewer workers, from the mines to the power plants. However, the Kentucky Public Service Commission (PSC) on July 15 only approved CCR-compliance projects at Mitchell, moving distinctly to deny projects related to the ELG rule. It was named after a Democratic National Committeeman from West Virginia. Ohio Valley ReSource. This week on Inside Appalachia, we speak with an author about grief rituals, a podcaster about the religious music of snake handling churches, and we explore best practices to prepare for retirement. Utility giant Duke Energy Corp. is among the companies accelerating coal plant retirements to meet company and North Carolina emissions-reduction goals. the commission denied about $4.2 million of expenses AEP had proposed for projects that would help the plants comply with the ELG rule. And while that order would have meant Mitchell will need to cease operations in 2028, the PSC on Aug. 19 issued another order granting Kentucky Powers request for a partial rehearing of the July 15 order. Our next steps will be to evaluate our options in light of those orders, determine the best path forward to meet the resource needs in each state, and return to the commissions if necessary for consideration of our updated costs and plans, a spokesperson said. Shutting down either plant would be hard on the economies of their local communities, not to mention the West Virginia coal industry in general. WV Educational Broadcasting Authority, the WVPB Foundation, and the Friends of WVPB. Whether they close in 2028, 2040 or sometime between, the three plants will leave a void in the surrounding communities. Editorial: Two power plants' future becomes uncertain In separate December 2020submitted cost recovery filings with regulators in West Virginia and Kentucky, two other AEP subsidiariesWheeling Power and Kentucky Powerhad also sought cost recovery for CCR and ELG investments for another West Virginia coal plant, AEPs 1,560-MW, The West Virginia Public Service Commission (WVPSC) on Aug. 4 ultimately approved cost recovery for both CCR and ELG investments at all three plantsAmos, Mountaineer, and Mitchell. From that year through 2020, power companies retired 95 gigawatts of that power, nearly a third. At the Virginia SCC, Appalachian Power had argued its proposed investments for specific projects at the Amos and Mountaineer plants were the most cost-effective means of compliance with the federal CCR and ELG rules. AEP says the energy generated at the John Amos Plant is enough to. More coal-fired power plants face closure as the nation transitions to cleaner sources of energy. Closing the Amos plant alone in 2028 could save $1.4 billion, the Sierra Club's analysis found. Appalachian Power's John E. Amos Plant uses about 6 to 7 million tons of coal each year. As part of a deal to secure a rate increase in Virginia, Appalachian Power has agreed to examine what would happen if the John Amos Power Plant in Putnam County and the Mountaineer Power Plant in Mason County were taken out of service ahead of schedule. But I think everybody knows that those plants are closing at some point.. The other two would close in five years. Choose wisely! The John Amos plant was included in this list, as it has not been inspected by the state in at least 10 years. The turn away from coal is part of AEPs long-term strategy. Don't knowingly lie about anyone 2023 Access Intelligence, LLC - All Rights Reserved. With a carbon tax, the Sierra Club projects that utility customers could save $2.4 billion if Amos closed in 2028; $1.5 billion if Amos and Mountaineer closed and $350 million if Mitchell closed. The John Amos power plant in Winfield, West Virginia, burns up to 27,000 tons of Appalachian coal each day to power more than 2 million homes and businesses across 3 states. Last year, Morgan Stanley went further and predicted there would be no coal producing electricity by 2033. Duke Energy will retire all of its power plants in the Carolinas that "rely exclusively on coal" or about 9,000 MW of capacity within the next ten years under the six scenarios outlined in its utilities' 2020 integrated resource plans. Governor signs four coal industry bills Wednesday The continued fall of coal in the U.S. will likely be steeper than most people think, said Robert Godby, an energy economist and dean at the University of Wyoming. John E. Amos Power Plant is a three-unit coal-fired power plant owned and operated by Appalachian Power. Recent months have seen a fresh round of new and accelerated retirement announcements driven by utilities adopting new climate policies and goals, said Seth Feaster, a data analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. The Congressional Budget Office estimates a $25 a ton carbon tax, indexed to inflation, could raise $1 trillion over a decade. The Mitchell Plant in Moundsville, the Mountaineer Plant in New Haven, and the John Amos Plant in Winfield require costly upgrades to comply with new federal environmental rules. Both are owned and operated by Appalachian Power, a subsidiary of American Electric Power, and both burn coal to generate electricity. Well determine the best path forward to meet the resource needs in each state, and return to the commissions if necessary for consideration of our updated costs and plans.. She says the legal fight over coal draws attention from a need to diversify the state's energy portfolio. Coal-fired power plants peaked at 314 gigawatts of electricity in 2011, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. additional options for reusing and discharging small volumes of bottom ash transport water, provides an exception for retiring units and extends the compliance deadline to a date as soon as possible beginning one year after the rule was published but no later than December 2025, the company said in late July. Such plants are becoming more scarce as the nation retires much of its coal fleet in a transition to other forms of electricity generation.Source: S&P Global Market Intelligence. AEP has committed to reducing its carbon dioxide emissions and obtaining more of its power from renewable resources while also divesting itself of much of its coal-powered generating fleet. In separate December 2020submitted cost recovery filings with regulators in West Virginia and Kentucky, two other AEP subsidiariesWheeling Power and Kentucky Powerhad also sought cost recovery for CCR and ELG investments for another West Virginia coal plant, AEPs 1,560-MW Mitchell Plant in Marshall County. "They want to make rules but they don't understand because they don't walk in those shoes," Mayor Summers said of EPA regulators. The region's recovery from the 2016 flood -- and continued reliance on the fossil fuel economy -- illustrate the dueling human and economic stakes in West Virginia's lawsuit against the EPA. Copyright 2021 West Virginia Public Broadcasting, West Virginia Public Broadcasting | "It's really a tough space for many of these plants to operate in.". Doing the work on their wastewater systems would delay the cost of retiring the plants and finding new sources of power to replace them. A proposed rule is expected in fall 2022. Keep it Clean. Thats seven years before the three West Virginia plants would close if utility customers pay for their upgrades. Were going to have additional hundreds of million dollars of investment thats going to be stranded and have to be paid for by the ratepayers, he said. File photo/HD Media They burned coal, a fossil fuel Appalachia has in abundance. Amos, a 2,930-MW coal plant located near the Kanawha River in Putnam County, West Virginia, is the AEP systems largest generating plant. The examiner also recommended that if the Virginia SCC did not ultimately grant Appalachian Power approval of the ELG investments, the regulatory body should delay consideration of the reasonableness and prudency of previously incurred ELG costs until a future case.. The plants are aging. Close. . Appalachian Power, the AEP subsidiary that owns the two plants, warned in its last 10-Q filing, dated July 22, that denial of ELG investment recovery could cause the company to close the generating facilities by 2028more than a decade earlier than their planned retirement in 2040. For example, NRG Energy Inc. announced June 17 that it would retire about 1,600 MW of coal capacity in the PJM Interconnection following the results of the May capacity auction. The SCCs order is a new setback for Appalachian Power, which has said cost recovery of CCR and ELG retrofits at the plants would allow their generating units to provide crucially needed capacity and energy value to the utilitys customers in Virginia and West Virginia through 2040. For Appalachian Power and Wheeling Power, the plans show that both American Electric Power subsidiaries will continue to rely on the John Amos, Mitchell and Mountaineer coal-fired plants. The John E. Amos Power Plant near Winfield, West Virginia, is being studied for early retirement, along with the Mountaineer Power Plant near New Haven, West Virginia. But one of the reports authors predicts they wont last to the end of this decade. A variety of resources for professional growth. The John E. Amos Power Plant near Winfield, West Virginia, is being studied for early retirement, along with the Mountaineer Power Plant near New Haven, West Virginia. Rain ending early. Sorry, there are no recent results for popular commented articles. John E Amos Power Plant is a 2,932.6MW coal fired power project. The SCC on Monday approved a $27.44 million Virginia revenue requirement for the first year of an environmental rate adjustment clause (E-RAC)a rider that recovers expenses from AEPs Virginia customers associated with federal rules regulating the disposal of coal ash at the two plants in West Virginia. Both are owned. "The coal industry has always kept our people in the dark, and I don't look for it to change. Slated retirements to cut US coal fleet to less than half 2015 capacity by 2035, IR In Focus | Episode 4: Insights to Navigate Investor Activism, Masters of Risk | Episode 2: A Discussion with Ilya Khaykin, According to Market Intelligence, April 2023, The 2,900-MW John E. Amos coal-fired power plant near Charleston, W.Va., has been producing power since the early 1970s. The plants three units were completed between 1971 and 1973. Editorial: Two power plants' future becomes uncertain The plants must be in compliance to operate beyond 2028. Our unique approach, utilizing dredging and concave contouring, reduced closure time and costs to rate payers. "While the EPA does have a narrow array of authority to act in the area of carbon emissions, it's nowhere near what the Biden administration is suggesting," said West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, a Republican, who warns thousands of jobs, industry profits, state tax revenue, and a reliable source of electricity are on the line. As noted here before, the coal-fired fleet in this region is expected to reach its scheduled retirement age sometime around 2040. expenses from AEPs Virginia customers associated with federal rules regulating the disposal of coal ash at the two plants in West Virginia. The Public Service Commission of West Virginia (PSC) approved Appalachian Power Co. (APCo) and Wheeling Power Co.s (WPCos), Just two weeks after FirstEnergy Corp. said it would close more than 2 GW of six older coal-fired, American Electric Power, one of the premier generating utilities in the U.S., is caught between a deregulated rockwholesale, Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC)on Aug. 23 rattled, American Electric Powers (AEPs) plans to operate the 2.9-GW John Amos and 1.3-GW Mountaineer coal power plants through 2040 when it partly denied cost recovery for expenses that the West Virginia plants need to comply with the federal.