Kentucky Power Wants To Keep Its Share Of Mitchell Coal Plant

Kentucky Power was supposed to give up its half of the Mitchell Plant in December 2028. 

At least that’s how the matter concluded in 2021, when the Kentucky Public Service Commission decided continued investment in the coal-burning plant would not be in the best interest of Kentucky electricity customers.

Earlier this week, though, Kentucky Power went back to Kentucky regulators and asked them to reopen the case.

After Kentucky’s PSC issued its decision nearly four years ago, West Virginia’s PSC decided that Appalachian Power and Wheeling Power customers would pick up the cost of keeping Mitchell in operation past 2028.

That involved upgrades to its wastewater treatment system, at a cost of $148 million.

Now, Kentucky Power seeks approval to pay for its share of the wastewater upgrade at Mitchell. 

“We continue to believe that that plant is valuable and will continue to serve our customers,” Bill Ferhman, President and CEO of Kentucky Power parent American Electric Power, told Kentucky lawmakers earlier this month.

In 2021, Kentucky’s Republican then-Attorney General Daniel Cameron encouraged state regulators to deny the investment in Mitchell. A better option for Kentucky Power’s customers, Cameron said then, would be to close it.

Byron Gary, program attorney for the Kentucky Resources Council, an environmental and public health advocacy group, says that’s still the best outcome.

“I’m not sure what Kentucky Power Company thinks may have changed in the interim,” Gary said.

Regardless, West Virginia paid for the Mitchell upgrades Kentucky didn’t.

In a statement, Charlotte Lane, chair of the West Virginia PSC, said the commission would monitor the development and take appropriate action.  

According to data from Standard & Poor’s, Mitchell had a capacity factor of less than 30% last year, meaning it generated electricity the least often of the three AEP plants in West Virginia. Amos and Mountaineer are the others.

The issue created some friction in the 2023 governor’s race in Kentucky. 

Cameron took criticism from a rival, Kelly Craft, a former ambassador who’s married to coal executive Joe Craft, for his stance on Mitchell.

Kelly Craft accused Cameron of turning his back on the region’s coal industry.

According to filings to the West Virginia PSC, the Mitchell plant was a customer of the Crafts’ coal company, Alliance Resource Partners.

Cameron won the Republican primary but lost to Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat.

This story was distributed by the Appalachia + Mid-South Newsroom, a collaboration between West Virginia Public Broadcasting, WPLN and WUOT in Tennessee, LPM, WEKU, WKMS and WKYU in Kentucky and NPR.