Tag: Mon Power

First Energy CEO Says Gas Will Replace Mon Power Coal Plants

First Energy President and CEO Brian Tierney said in the company’s fourth quarter earnings presentation Thursday that the new plants would cost $4 billion to $6 billion.

The CEO of Mon Power parent First Energy said the company plans to replace its West Virginia coal plants with natural gas.

Mon Power’s Harrison and Fort Martin plants are scheduled to shut down between 2035 and 2040. To replace them, the company will construct 3 to 4 gigawatts of combined cycle natural gas plants, beginning in the next five years.

First Energy President and CEO Brian Tierney said in the company’s fourth quarter earnings presentation Thursday that the new plants would cost $4 billion to $6 billion.

“If we were to start building for that eventuality, I could see the spend for that coming in in years four and five of our plan today and continuing beyond the 2029 period,” he said.

Tierney said First Energy would submit the plan to the West Virginia Public Service Commission later this year.

The PSC would need to approve First Energy’s Integrated Resource Plan, its blueprint for the next several years.

West Virginia depends on coal for nearly 90% of its electricity, and state and local leaders have resisted moving away from it.

Surrounding states, especially Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia, have sharply pivoted to natural gas in the past 10 to 15 years.

American Electric Power, which provides electricity in southern West Virginia through its Appalachian Power subsidiary, has told state regulators it’s considering a full or partial conversion of its Amos and Mountaineer coal plants to gas.

In 2021, the PSC approved $448 million in environmental compliance upgrades to the Amos, Mountaineer and Mitchell plants to keep them in operation past 2028. No coal plant retirements are on the immediate horizon in West Virginia.

Harrison, which is in Harrison County, began operating in 1971. Fort Martin, which is in Monongalia County, began operating in 1967.

Winter Storm: More Power Outages, Longer Waits In Bluefield

As of Tuesday afternoon, about 27,000 West Virginia customers of Appalachian Power remained without electricity because of this week’s winter storm, down from 50,000.

As of Tuesday afternoon, about 27,000 West Virginia customers of Appalachian Power remained without electricity because of this week’s winter storm, down from 50,000.

Notably, more than 10,000 of those still waiting were in the Mercer County city of Bluefield.

While the company estimated that customers in other areas would see power restored by 8 p.m. Wednesday, it estimated that Bluefield customers would have to wait until 11 p.m. Wednesday.

Appalachian Power said it has 6,000 personnel working to restore service. The worst damage took place in Lincoln, Clay, Mercer, Summers and Wayne counties, the company said.

Appalachian Power serves about a million customers in southern West Virginia and southwest Virginia. The company reported more than 1,700 locations across its service territory that need repairs.

Mon Power and Potomac Edison meanwhile, reported nearly 2,000 outages on Tuesday, down from 3,000 on Monday.

Appalachian Power customers can monitor an outage map, as well as sign up for service updates by email or text, by visiting the company’s website.

Winter Storm Leaves Over 50,000 Without Power Statewide

As of Monday afternoon, about 94,000 customers were without electricity in Appalachian Power’s service territory in West Virginia and Virginia.

This is a developing story and may be updated.

Appalachian Power said Monday that the winter storm blanketing the region with snow and ice has caused 50,000 customers in West Virginia to lose power.

As of Monday afternoon, about 98,000 customers in West Virginia and Virginia were without electricity in Appalachian Power’s service territory. Mercer County appeared to be the most affected, with over 12,000 outages.

The company said most of the outages happened between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. Monday as the snow changed over to ice.

Mon Power reported 3,000 outages in West Virginia, including Potomac Edison service territory in the state.

Appalachian Power said it has 5,500 personnel working to restore power across its footprint. While the company didn’t give a timeline for restored service, it said its priorities included hospitals, 911 call centers, water treatment plants and police and fire stations.

Affected customers can sign up for text or email alerts for service updates as well as monitor the outage map on the company’s website.

PSC Gives Longview Power Extension For Gas, Solar Projects

Longview Power, which operates a coal-burning plant near the Pennsylvania border, applied to the PSC in 2020 for a siting certificate to build a gas plant and solar facility.

The West Virginia Public Service Commission has granted an extension to Longview Power to build a natural gas plant and a solar facility in Monongalia County.

Longview Power, which operates a coal-burning plant near the Pennsylvania border, applied to the PSC in 2020 for a siting certificate to build a gas plant and solar facility.

Construction on the project was to have begun by April 2025, but Longview now says the COVID-19 pandemic that hit the US in 2020, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and supply chain disruptions have made that difficult to achieve.

On Tuesday, the PSC granted an extension for Longview to begin construction by April 2029 and to complete the project by April 2034.

Longview plans to build a 1,200-megawatt combined-cycle gas plant, alongside a 70-megawatt solar facility that straddles the state border.

Longview is an independent power producer that supplies electricity to the PJM regional grid.

Longview’s coal plant is adjacent to Mon Power’s Fort Martin Power Station, which includes a coal plant and a solar facility.

Mon Power’s Fort Martin solar facility began operating in January and is the state’s largest. The coal plant is scheduled to retire in 2034.

Mon Power, Potomac Edison Receive Federal Funds For Grid

The funding will help make the electricity grid more reliable for customers and enable the electrification of buildings and transportation.

FirstEnergy subsidiaries Mon Power and Potomac Edison were awarded $50 million though the U.S. Department of Energy’s Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships, or GRIP program.

The funding will help make the electricity grid more reliable for customers and enable the electrification of buildings and transportation.

In part, the upgrades aim to reduce the duration of service disruptions due to severe weather.

The program was created under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021.

U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito supported the infrastructure law and the FirstEnergy application for the GRIP funding. Capito is the senior Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

“West Virginians deserve reliable access to electricity that keeps their lights on and homes warm. Initiatives like this strengthen the reliability of our grid and prevent our residents from experiencing costly interruptions that impact their lives and safety,” she said in a statement.

The funding will also create a four-year apprenticeship program with training centers in Fairmont and Williamsport, Maryland, near Martinsburg.

Mon Power Repurposes Brownfield Sites For Solar Power

On a winding road just up the hill from a shuttered coal plant, Mon Power is now generating electricity from an array of solar panels.

On a winding road just up the hill from a shuttered coal plant, Mon Power is now generating electricity from an array of solar panels.

The Rivesville solar facility doesn’t produce as much power as the coal plant once did, nor the ones Mon Power still operates. It is, though, an example of reusing brownfield sites – in this case a coal ash disposal landfill – to produce clean energy in a state dominated by fossil fuels. 

Doug Hartman, Mon Power’s director of generation services, says state lawmakers made that possible.

“So this is the Rivesville ash site disposal area for the old Rivesville coal plant, and it retired in 2012,” he said. “Senate Bill 583 gave us an opportunity to put an asset on something that’s a legacy liability, and we’re able to put the solar right on top of the site.”

West Virginia lawmakers passed Senate Bill 583 in 2020. It allows utilities like Mon Power to develop solar on brownfield sites. Mon Power activated its largest project in Monongalia County in January. Last month, it broke ground on another one in Berkeley County. The company will seek approval to build two more near Davis in Tucker County and Weirton in Hancock County.

“You’re using, again, property that like the site here, property that you normally wouldn’t be able to leverage, just to go out and build something on,” he said. “Honestly, that’s where I would like to see all forms of energy, put them on a site that’s already, already out there and is available, not a new greenfield site. West Virginia is too pretty for greenfield site construction.”

The Rivesville site can produce 5.5 megawatts of electricity and Fort Martin about 19. By contrast, Mon Power’s Harrison Power Station can produce nearly 2,000 megawatts, all of it from coal.

Hartman says the coal plants aren’t going anywhere soon. But changing regulations, the age of the plants and the cost of buying coal could shift the calculation. And West Virginia may see yet more solar.

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