Directors of the Tennessee Valley Authority today unanimously voted to spend $185 million to install pollution controls on another couple of units at its Shawnee coal plant in Kentucky.
TVA is under a consent order with EPA and environmental groups that sued the federal utility to either clean up or shut down the aging units within the next two years. TVA faced a Wednesday deadline to tell EPA of its decision.
TVA will install scrubbers and selective catalytic control devices on Units 1 and 4 of the 9-unit plant to limit sulfur and nitrogen oxide emissions, which are linked with smog and other air pollutants.
TVA Chief Operating Officer Chip Pardee said the Shawnee plant near Paducah, Ky., is one of TVA’s most reliable and is close to Appalachian coal fields. Pardee said the plant “is in excellent physical condition” and can be used to help adjust to changing load demands in the northern portions of TVA’s 7-state service territory.
TVA considered converting the units to biomass or natural gas and also studied the feasibility of shutting down the units. Pardee said the least cost option for TVA was to install the pollution control equipment and keep the two units operating.
The other seven units at Shawnee are not affected by today’s decision.
TVA President Bill Johnson said today’s decision is in accordance with TVA’s economic development and environmental stewardship goals.
In the past year, TVA previously decided to shut down coal units at its Allen plant in Memphis and the Paradise plant in Kentucky and convert those units to natural gas. But the Shawnee plant can be brought into EPA compliance at a lesser cost than those units, Johnson said.