The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) has approved a coal fleet plan that will retire eight coal units at three plant sites with more than 3,000 MW of combined generating capacity. A number of these units were already idled or scheduled for idling and/or retirement based on an agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency.
The retirements affect all five coal units at the Colbert Fossil Plant in Tuscumbia, Alabama (four 178 MW units and a 472 MW unit, i.e. a total capacity of 1.2 GW); one of two operating coal units at Widows Creek Fossil Plant in Stevenson, Alabama (473 MW), and two of three coal units at the Paradise Fossil Plant near Central City, Kentucky (2x704 MW). Paradise Unit 3, one of TVA’s largest coal units, will continue to operate.
TVA conducted detailed analyses including an Environmental Assessment to review options for meeting stricter air quality regulations at the Paradise plant, including installing additional emission controls on Units 1 and 2, building a new gas-fired generating plant at the site or taking no action. Based on that review, TVA approved the construction of a gas-fired plant at Paradise. This will result in an investment of approximately US$1bn at the site. The two coal units will be retired when the gas plant is available.
Interested in Global Energy Research?
Enerdata's premium online information service provides up-to-date market reports on 110+ countries. The reports include valuable market data and analysis as well as a daily newsfeed, curated by our energy analysts, on the oil, gas, coal and power markets.
This user-friendly tool gives you the essentials about the domestic markets of your concern, including market structure, organisation, actors, projects and business perspectives.