Huntley Generating Station (existing)
 |
|
This article is part of the Coal Issues portal on SourceWatch, a project of Global Energy Monitor and the Center for Media and Democracy. See here for help on adding material to CoalSwarm. |
C.R. Huntley Generating Station was a coal-fired power station owned and operated by NRG Energy near Tonawanda, New York.
The first four units, built in the 1940-50s, were retired in 2006-7.[1] The last two units, built in 1957-8, were retired on March 1, 2016.[2]
Contents
Community opposition and retirement
In 2013 the Clean Air Coalition of Western New York and the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis initiated a community-wide process to explore how Tonawanda could continue to meet its energy needs without coal, once the aging plant retires. The group has opposed any new subsidies for Huntley.[3]
In August 2015, NRG Energy submitted a plan to the NY Public Service Commission to retire the facility on March 1, 2016. Company officials cited economic factors, especially low natural gas prices. According to a report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), Huntley's pretax earnings dropped by $113 million between 2008 and 2012, and the plant was most recently showing an average annual loss of $1 million. NRG disputed the figures.[4]
Plant Data
- Owner: NRG Huntley Operations
- Parent Company: NRG Energy
- Plant Nameplate Capacity: 816 MW (Megawatts)
- Units and In-Service Dates: 80 MW (1942), 100 MW (1948), 100 MW (1953), 100 MW (1954), 200 MW (1957), 200 MW (1958)
- Location: 3500 River Rd., Tonawanda, NY 14150
- GPS Coordinates: 42.97025, -78.931222
- Retirement: Scheduled for March 1, 2016
- Coal Consumption:
- Coal Source:
- Number of Employees:
Emissions Data
- 2006 CO2 Emissions: 3,301,283 tons
- 2006 SO2 Emissions: 12,299 tons
- 2006 SO2 Emissions per MWh:
- 2006 NOx Emissions: 3,265 tons
- 2005 Mercury Emissions: 167 lb.
Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Huntley 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.[5] 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.[6]
Table 1: Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Huntley Generating Station
| Type of Impact | Annual Incidence | Valuation |
|---|---|---|
| Deaths | 15 | $110,000,000 |
| Heart attacks | 26 | $2,800,000 |
| Asthma attacks | 230 | $12,000 |
| Hospital admissions | 12 | $270,000 |
| Chronic bronchitis | 9 | $4,000,000 |
| Asthma ER visits | 11 | $4,000 |
Source: "Find Your Risk from Power Plant Pollution," Clean Air Task Force interactive table, accessed February 2011
Articles and Resources
Sources
- ↑ Form EIA-860 Data - Schedule 3, 'Generator Data' US EIA, 2014
- ↑ "Settlement reached on new assessment of Huntley property," Buffalo News, Aug 9, 2016
- ↑ "In Western New York, an Instructive Tale of Two Coal-Fired Plants," IEEFA, May 15, 2015
- ↑ T.J. Pignataro, "Tonawanda braces for end of Huntley era," Buffalo News, 25 August 2015
- ↑ "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.
Related SourceWatch Articles
- Huntley Generating Station
- Existing U.S. Coal Plants
- New York and coal
- NRG Energy
- United States and coal
- Global warming
External Articles
| This article is a stub. You can help by expanding it. |
