Monticello Steam Electric Station

Last updated
Monticello Steam Electric Station
Monticello Steam Electric Station
CountryUnited States
Location Titus County, southwest of Mount Pleasant, Texas
Coordinates 33°5′28″N95°2′17″W / 33.09111°N 95.03806°W / 33.09111; -95.03806 Coordinates: 33°5′28″N95°2′17″W / 33.09111°N 95.03806°W / 33.09111; -95.03806
StatusDecommissioned
Commission date Unit 1: December, 1974
Unit 2: December, 1975
Unit 3: August, 1978
Decommission dateUnits 1–3: January, 2018
Owner(s) Luminant
Thermal power station
Primary fuel Coal
Turbine technology Steam turbine
Cooling sourceartificial Lake Monticello on Big Cypress Bayou
Power generation
Nameplate capacity 1,880 MW
[ edit on Wikidata]

The Monticello Steam Electric Station was a 1.8-gigawatt (1,880 MW) coal-fired power plant located southwest of Mount Pleasant, Texas, in Titus County, Texas. It operated from 1974 to 2018.

Contents

History

Monticello had three units. Unit 1 began operations in 1974, Unit 2 became operational in 1975, and Unit 3, became operational in 1978. [1] Originally, the plant produced electricity by burning lignite from nearby mines in Texas. Later the plant received rail shipments of coal solely from Peabody Energy's Rawhide Mine in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming. [2] [3] The plant was cooled by Lake Monticello, which also offers fishing and recreational facilities. The plant was owned by Luminant, a division of Energy Future Holdings. [4] It was operated by Vistra Energy. [5]

Selective non-catalytic reduction (SNCR) systems were retrofitted by Fluor to Monticello's units in 2008. [6] [7] This retrofit complimented the LO-NOx burners already installed at Monticello to reduce nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions. [6] In November 2011, Luminant announced that, rather than retrofitting, they would permanently idle Units 1 and 2 to comply with the United States Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Cross-State Air Pollution Rule. [8] With two units of the plant being idled, Luminant halted lignite extraction at nearby Sulphur Springs and Mount Pleasant Mines. [9] It later restarted the units in March 2014 due increased demand for power generation from the 2014 North American cold wave. [10] Luminant made the decision in 2014 that Monticello would rely on coal solely from the Powder River Basin beginning in 2016. [3]

Closure

Vistra announced in October 2017 that all three units would cease power generation in January 2018 due to advancements in renewable energy and a glut of natural gas depressing wholesale power prices. [5] The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) permitted the closure of Monticello at a hearing in November 2017. [11] The closure was scheduled for January 4, 2018. [5]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lignite</span> Soft, brown, combustible, sedimentary rock

Lignite, often referred to as brown coal, is a soft, brown, combustible, sedimentary rock formed from naturally compressed peat. It has a carbon content around 25–35%, and is considered the lowest rank of coal due to its relatively low heat content. When removed from the ground, it contains a very high amount of moisture which partially explains its low carbon content. Lignite is mined all around the world and is used almost exclusively as a fuel for steam-electric power generation.

Energy Future Holdings Corporation is an electric utility company headquartered in Energy Plaza in Downtown Dallas, Texas, United States. The majority of the company's power generation is through coal and nuclear power plants. From 1998 to 2007, the company was known as TXU Corporation until its $45 billion leveraged buyout by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, TPG Capital and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners. That purchase was the largest leveraged buyout in history. As of 2019, TXU Energy is a subsidiary of publicly traded Vistra Energy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TXU Energy</span> American retail electricity provider

TXU Energy is an American retail electricity provider headquartered in Irving, Texas, serving residential and business customers in deregulated regions of Texas since the deregulation of the Texas electricity market in 2002. A subsidiary of Vistra Corp, it is one of the largest retail electricity providers in Texas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Powder River Basin</span> Geologic structural basin in the western US

The Powder River Basin is a geologic structural basin in southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming, about 120 miles (190 km) east to west and 200 miles (320 km) north to south, known for its extensive coal reserves. The former hunting grounds of the Oglala Lakota, the area is very sparsely populated and is known for its rolling grasslands and semiarid climate.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William H. Zimmer Power Station</span>

The William H. Zimmer Power Station, located near Moscow, Ohio, was a 1.35-gigawatt coal power plant. Planned by Cincinnati Gas and Electric (CG&E), with Columbus & Southern Ohio Electric and Dayton Power & Light (DP&L) as its partners, it was originally intended to be a nuclear power plant. Although once estimated to be 97% complete, poor construction and quality assurance (QA) led to the plant being converted to coal-fired generation. The plant began operations in 1991. Today, the plant is owned and operated by Vistra Corp.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant</span> Nuclear power station in Texas

Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant is located in Somervell County, Texas. The nuclear power plant is located 40 miles (64 km) southwest of Ft. Worth and about 60 miles (97 km) southwest of Dallas. It relies on nearby Squaw Creek Reservoir for cooling water. The plant has about 1,300 employees and is operated by Luminant Generation, a subsidiary of Vistra Corp.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">J. Robert Welsh Power Plant</span> Coal power plant in Texas, US

J. Robert Welsh Power Plant is a 1-gigawatt, coal power plant located east of Pittsburg, Texas in Titus County, Texas. It is operated by SWEPCO, a subsidiary of AEP. The plant is named after J. Robert Welsh, a former President and Board Chairman of SWEPCO.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Luminant</span>

Luminant is a Texas-based electric utility. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Energy Future Holdings Corporation. Luminant's operations include electricity generation and wholesaling, mining, construction, and development. The company has capacity for the generation of 18,300 megawatts (MW) of electricity in 20 power plants spread across Texas, of which 2,300 MW come from nuclear power generated at the company's Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant, 5,800 MW from coal-fired power plants, and the remainder from natural gas-fired plants. Luminant is also a major purchaser of wind power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rawhide Mine</span> Coal mine in Gillette, Wyoming, United States

The Rawhide Mine is a coal mine located 10 miles (16.1 km) north of Gillette, Wyoming in the United States in the coal-rich Powder River Basin. The mine is an open pit mine that utilizes a combination of cast blast/dozer push and truck/shovel mining methods to strip an average of 165 feet (50.3m) of overburden off of approximately 105 (32.0m) feet of coal. Rawhide produces a low-sulfur, sub-bituminous coal from the Roland and Smith seams. This coal is used for domestic energy generation and shipped to customers via railroad. The mine is currently owned and operated by Peabody Energy.

Prairie State Energy Campus is a 1,600 megawatt base load, coal-fired, electrical power station and coal mine near Marissa, Illinois southeast of St. Louis, Missouri. Prairie State Energy Campus (PSEC) features low levels of regulated emissions compared to other coal-fired power stations, capturing sulfur from high-sulfur coal mined nearby instead of transporting low-sulfur coal from elsewhere.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amyntaio Power Plant</span>

Amyntaio Power Station is a 600 MW coal-fired power station near Amyntaio in Western Macedonia, Greece. Build and commissioned in the mid 1980s, the power station is fuelled by lignite from the adjacent Amyntaio coal mine.

Coal gasification is a process whereby a hydrocarbon feedstock (coal) is converted into gaseous components by applying heat under pressure in the presence of steam. Rather than burning, most of the carbon-containing feedstock is broken apart by chemical reactions that produce "syngas." Syngas is primarily hydrogen and carbon monoxide, but the exact composition can vary. In Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) systems, the syngas is cleaned and burned as fuel in a combustion turbine which then drives an electric generator. Exhaust heat from the combustion turbine is recovered and used to create steam for a steam turbine-generator. The use of these two types of turbines in combination is one reason why gasification-based power systems can achieve high power generation efficiencies. Currently, commercially available gasification-based systems can operate at around 40% efficiencies. Syngas, however, emits more greenhouse gases than natural gas, and almost twice as much carbon as a coal plant. Coal gasification is also water-intensive.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Lake Power Plant</span>

Martin Lake Power Plant is a 2,250-megawatt coal power plant located southwest of Tatum, Texas, in Rusk County, Texas. The plant is owned by Luminant. It began operations in 1977. The plant is also served by the Luminant owned Martin Lake Line, shuttling coal from nearby as well as the Powder River Basin in Wyoming via BNSF.

Sandow Power Plant was a 1.1-gigawatt coal power plant located southwest of Rockdale, Texas in Milam County, Texas. It was operated by Luminant, a subsidiary of Vistra Corp. The plant closed in 2018.

Big Brown Power Plant was a 1.15-gigawatt coal power plant located northeast of Fairfield near Fairfield Lake State Park in Freestone County, Texas. It was operated by Vistra Corp's subsidiary, Luminant. The plant operated from 1971 to 2018.

Coffeen Power Station was a 915 megawatt (MW) coal power plant located south of Coffeen, Illinois near Coffeen Lake State Fish and Wildlife Area in Montgomery County, Illinois. The plant was owned by Vistra Energy. Coffeen began operations in 1965 and was shut down on November 1, 2019.

Oak Grove Power Plant is a 1.79-gigawatt, coal power plant located north of Franklin, Texas in Robertson County, Texas. The plant is operated by Luminant, a subsidiary of Vistra Energy. It began operations in 2010.

The Šoštanj Power Plant, also known as the Sostanj Thermal Power Plant, is a lignite, heating oil and natural gas fueled power station on the bank of the Paka River near Šoštanj, Slovenia. Termoelektrarna Šoštanj is the owner and operator of the plant; TEŠ is fully owned by Holding Slovenske Elektrarne (HSE), which is 100% held by the Republic of Slovenia.

Vistra is a Fortune 275 integrated retail electricity and power generation company based in Irving, Texas.

References

  1. ↑ "Existing Electric Generating Units in the United States, 2006" (Excel). Energy Information Administration, U.S. Department of Energy. 2006. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
  2. ↑ "How Texas Coal Plant Closure Affects Peabody Energy". 24/7 Wall St. MarketWatch. October 13, 2017. Retrieved November 3, 2017.
  3. 1 2 "Luminant closing mines, laying off 80". Longview News-Journal . February 29, 2016. Retrieved October 23, 2017.
  4. ↑ Luminant (2010). "Monticello Power Plant and Mines."
  5. 1 2 3 Osborne, James (October 6, 2017). "Vistra closing mega coal plant in East Texas". Houston Chronicle . Retrieved October 6, 2017.
  6. 1 2 Nastu, Paul (February 19, 2008). "Luminant Details Emissions Reduction Plan". Environmental Leader. Retrieved February 15, 2018.
  7. ↑ "Fluor to provide air quality upgrades". Power Engineering. April 17, 2008. Retrieved February 15, 2018.
  8. ↑ Campbell, David (November 18, 2011). "An Update on the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule from David Campbell". Luminant. Retrieved October 16, 2017.
  9. ↑ Smith, J.B. (September 13, 2011). "Freestone coal mine to close, costing about 200 jobs". Waco Tribune-Herald . Retrieved October 22, 2017.
  10. ↑ Osborne, James (February 2014). "Luminant to reopen 3 coal plants early". The Dallas Morning News . Retrieved October 6, 2017.
  11. ↑ Blum, Jordan (November 1, 2017). "Texas letting one coal plant shutter, undecided on two others". Houston Chronicle. Retrieved November 1, 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.