Energy Department orders aging coal units to stay open as administration seeks to halt retirements

Over the past eight months the Energy Department has ordered generators at five coal-burning power plants that had been headed for retirement to stay open, and White House officials said they plan to keep open as many coal plants as they can and prevent further retirements over the next three years.

At a White House event, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the administration’s goal is “to stop the political closure of coal plants.” The moves are straining operators and exposing worn equipment. Two of the units ordered to stay online are currently broken; one R.M. Schahfer turbine has been offline since the summer and repairing it could take “six months or longer,” a utility official told regulators, and a coal unit at the Craig Generating Station is offline because of a broken valve.

Utilities that had planned retirements cancelled maintenance -- for example, Consumer Energy canceled roughly $161 million in upkeep at the J.H. Campbell plant -- and some operators say costs to extend old units are large and disputed. Consumers Energy reported spending $164 million from May to September to keep a plant running while it earned $84 million in revenue, and Grid Strategies estimated preventing retirements could cost consumers at least $3 billion per year.

Key Topics

Politics, Energy Department, Chris Wright, Federal Power Act, J.h. Campbell, R.m. Schahfer