By The Associated Press via the Sierra Vista Herald
Requiring a coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation to further regulate pollution would not force the plant’s retirement, but it could significantly increase water rates for agricultural users and American Indian tribes. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been considering how to lower nitrogen oxide emissions from the Navajo Generating Station near Page. The power plant already has low-nitrogen oxide burners, but the EPA could mandate that the owners install more expensive technology such as selective catalytic reduction.
The federal government created the 2,250-megawatt plant to ensure a low-cost water supply for the Central Arizona Project, which delivers the water through a series of canals to 80% of the state’s population. It also ensures that water rights settlements with tribes are met.
The cost burden of additional retrofits or a shutdown would fall most heavily on the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation because it lacks a comparable rate structure for recovering capital costs. The Reclamation Bureau and the Central Arizona Water Conservation District rely on the plant for 92% of electricity needed for the canals, while other plant owners rely on it for between 9% and 26% of their electric supply.
A second phase of the study will look at alternatives to coal generation such as solar or geothermal.
The owners, along with the Navajo Nation, have been pushing EPA to accept the low-nitrogen oxide burners as the best way to reduce regional haze. The added capital and production costs from installing selective catalytic reduction technology ranges from $57M and $70M a year over 20 years. The plant’s operator, Salt River Project, said the cost of controls, a right of way extension, a site lease and a coal supply lease add to the uncertainty of the plant’s future.
The study noted installing the more expensive pollution controls would be cheaper than shutting down the plant and replacing the power with other sources in the West. The study also looked at the impact to the Navajo and Hopi tribes, whose reservations hold the coal that feeds the plant, the impact on energy production and the remaining life of the plant.
Read more at: The Sierra Vista Herald