England Generating Station
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B.L. England Generating Station was a 163-megawatt (MW) coal-fired power station near Marmora, New Jersey.
The plant was put on standby in 2017,[1] and retired in May 2019.[2]
It is planned to be converted into a wind energy facility.[1]
Contents
Ownership
On August 17, 2006, Pepco announced that its subsidiary Atlantic City Electric Company reached an agreement to sell the facility to RC Cape May Holdings, LLC, an affiliate of Rockland Capital Energy Investments, LLC for $12.2 million.[3]
Retirement
In June 2012 RC Cape May Holdings LLC said it will shut down one coal-fired unit at the B.L. England power plant and retrofit a second coal-fired unit to a natural gas turbine and will re-fuel a third, oil-burning unit with natural gas. The agreement resolves violations of the Clean Air Act that occurred when the plant was under the ownership of Atlantic Electric, Conectiv, and Pepco Holdings Co. The previous owners did not make pollution-control upgrades as required by the federal Clean Air Act when they made significant upgrades to operational features of the plant.[4]
The agreement calls for the cessation of operation of coal-fired Unit 1 by fall 2013; until that occurs, the company must take steps to minimize emissions from this unit. Unit 2, which currently burns coal, and Unit 3, which burns fuel oil and only operates during peak demand periods, are to be converted to natural gas by May 2016.[4]
Unit 1 was shut down in May 2014. A permit to convert unit 2 from coal to a 447 MW gas plant was issued in April 2016 by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. The gas plant is planned for 2020. The permit, and permits for pipelines to transport the gas to the plant, are being challenged by environmental groups.[5]
In April 2017 it was reported the plant would continue to operate under a directive from PJM Interconnection, the operator of the nation's largest power grid. PJM wants the units to keep running for another two years while transmission upgrades now underway are completed "to maintain the reliability of the power grid," according to PJM. That work is not expected to be finished until 2019.[6]
In February 2019 it was reported the England plant would be converted into a wind energy facility. The transition to wind power may make it harder for the proposed Cape Atlantic Reliability Project to get approval, a proposed 22-mile pipeline that would have carried natural gas across Cumberland and Cape May counties to B.L. England, primarily to fuel the new gas plant.[1]
Plant Data
- Owner: RC Cape May Holdings
- Parent Company: Rockland Capital Energy Investments
- Plant Nameplate Capacity: 299 Megawatts (MW)
- Units and In-Service Dates: 136 MW (1962), 163 MW (1964)
- Location: 900 North Shore Rd., Marmora, NJ 08223
- GPS Coordinates: 39.289724, -74.633944
- Coal Consumption:
- Coal Source:
- Number of Employees:
Emissions Data
- 2006 CO2 Emissions: 1,681,692 tons
- 2006 SO2 Emissions:
- 2006 SO2 Emissions per MWh:
- 2006 NOx Emissions:
- 2005 Mercury Emissions:
Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from England Generating Station
In 2010, Abt Associates issued a study commissioned by the Clean Air Task Force, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, quantifying the deaths and other health effects attributable to fine particle pollution from coal-fired power plants.[7] Fine particle pollution consists of a complex mixture of soot, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. Among these particles, the most dangerous are those less than 2.5 microns in diameter, which are so tiny that they can evade the lung's natural defenses, enter the bloodstream, and be transported to vital organs. Impacts are especially severe among the elderly, children, and those with respiratory disease. The study found that over 13,000 deaths and tens of thousands of cases of chronic bronchitis, acute bronchitis, asthma, congestive heart failure, acute myocardial infarction, dysrhythmia, ischemic heart disease, chronic lung disease, and pneumonia each year are attributable to fine particle pollution from U.S. coal plant emissions. These deaths and illnesses are major examples of coal's external costs, i.e. uncompensated harms inflicted upon the public at large. Low-income and minority populations are disproportionately impacted as well, due to the tendency of companies to avoid locating power plants upwind of affluent communities. To monetize the health impact of fine particle pollution from each coal plant, Abt assigned a value of $7,300,000 to each 2010 mortality, based on a range of government and private studies. Valuations of illnesses ranged from $52 for an asthma episode to $440,000 for a case of chronic bronchitis.[8]
Table 1: Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from the England Generating Station
| Type of Impact | Annual Incidence | Valuation |
|---|---|---|
| Deaths | 19 | $140,000,000 |
| Heart attacks | 32 | $3,500,000 |
| Asthma attacks | 300 | $16,000 |
| Hospital admissions | 15 | $340,000 |
| Chronic bronchitis | 11 | $5,000,000 |
| Asthma ER visits | 13 | $5,000 |
Source: "Find Your Risk from Power Plant Pollution," Clean Air Task Force interactive table, accessed February 2011
Articles and Resources
Sources
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "It polluted N.J. for years. Now Murphy wants to convert coal plant to wind," NJ.com, Feb 28, 2019
- ↑ "N.J.'s largest remaining coal plant is shutting down for good. Clean energy may be its future," NJ.com, Apr 30, 2019
- ↑ "Atlantic City Electric Sells Generation Asset", Pepco Holdings press release, August 17, 2006
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 "Coal-fired B.L. England power plant to switch to natural gas," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, June 25, 2012.
- ↑ "N.J. power plant dispute: Will coal-to-gas just keep an environmental 'dinosaur' alive?" Philly.com, Aug 8, 2016
- ↑ Tom Johnson, "N.J. coal-fired power plant to remain open for 2 more years," NJ.com, April 17, 2017
- ↑ "The Toll from Coal: An Updated Assessment of Death and Disease from America's Dirtiest Energy Source," Clean Air Task Force, September 2010.
- ↑ "Technical Support Document for the Powerplant Impact Estimator Software Tool," Prepared for the Clean Air Task Force by Abt Associates, July 2010
- Existing Electric Generating Units in the United States, 2005, Energy Information Administration, accessed Jan. 2009.
- Environmental Integrity Project, "Dirty Kilowatts: America’s Most Polluting Power Plants", July 2007.
- Facility Registry System, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, accessed Jan. 2009.
- Carbon Monitoring for Action database, accessed Feb. 2009.
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