West Virginia has its largest generation announcement since the John Amos coal plant, and nobody has said yet where the plants will stand. Governor Patrick Morrisey told the state's annual Energy Summit on 12 November that Appalachian Power, the West Virginia utility of American Electric Power, will spend $17 billion on three natural gas plants with about 3 GW between them, all to be running by 2031.
A second commitment came with it: $7.5 billion for upgrades at the utility's existing coal plants, spread over the years to 2050. POWER magazine puts the two together at nearly $25 billion.
Three Projects, Sites To Follow
According to WV MetroNews, the three gas projects are spread across the state. Morrisey said locations and further details would come later, POWER reports, and none of the published accounts names a turbine, an engine or a plant type. The governor's office expects about 2,050 construction jobs and 100 permanent ones, and calls the 3 GW the largest single announcement by capacity in the state's history, ahead of the roughly 2.9 GW of the Amos plant announced in the early 1970s.
On bills, the governor's line is firm. The projects fall under his ratepayer protection pledge, under which the infrastructure costs are not to be passed to existing households and businesses, and he said he had been assured that power bills would not rise because of the new plants. No figures on rates were published, and none of the reports mentions a filing with the state Public Service Commission so far.
The Coal Side
POWER lists the three AEP coal stations in the state: John Amos at Winfield, 2.9 GW, built in 1971 to 1973 and expected to run at least through 2040; Mountaineer at New Haven, 1.3 GW; and Mitchell at Moundsville, 1.6 GW. What the $7.5 billion buys at each station has not been said.
The announcement is part of Morrisey's "50 by 50" programme, which aims to take the state from about 16 GW of capacity to 50 GW. The governor's office counts 11.67 GW announced so far. Other gas projects in the pipeline, as listed by POWER, include a 1.2 GW combined-cycle plant of Mon Power at Fort Martin, Competitive Power Ventures' 2.1 GW Shay Energy Center in Doddridge County and Kindle Energy's 600 MW Wolf Summit plant in Harrison County. The Mon Power plant came up in our item on FirstEnergy's data center demand.
2031 Is Not Far For 3 GW
Five years is a short time for three plants of this size when large gas turbine slots are being sold into the next decade. Whether Appalachian Power goes for combined cycle, simple-cycle peakers or engines will depend partly on what it can still get delivered, and that choice usually comes before the sites are made public, not after.
West Virginia sites have their own conditions to plan for: valley locations, elevation, summer humidity and winter freezing on the same plant. Whoever bids on the balance of plant should expect the specification to arrive late and the schedule not to move.
Sources: Office of the Governor of West Virginia, POWER magazine, WV MetroNews
