The state’s largest utility proposes to close its coal plant 20 years earlier than originally planned.
Portland General Electric is proposing to close its Boardman plant – the state’s only coal-fired power plant – 20 years earlier than planned.
PGE sees its new plan as a low-cost, least-risk route for the plant, which has come under significant scrutiny for its clean air violations. Boardman is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in Oregon.
In a letter Thursday to the Oregon Public Utility Commission, the state’s largest utility said it is pursuing an alternative to its existing operating plan for its Boardman coal plant, located about 150 miles east of Portland. That plan calls for PGE to invest more than a half billion dollars in pollution controls at the plant by 2017 to comply with federal and state clean air regulations, then keep it running until 2040.
Instead, the company hopes regulators will allow it to make a $45 million investment next year to partially clean up its emissions of mercury and oxides of nitrogen, then operate the plant only until 2020.
Read the full story at OregonLive.com.
{biztweet}PGE Boardman close{/biztweet}
