The company is planning to retire six existing units at the Eagle Valley Generating Station and retire or refuel four at Harding Street Generating Station, with a combined total of 600MW or 18% of the company’s total generation capacity.
IPL CEO Ken Zagzebski said the company has considered all the options during a very extensive and competitive evaluation process.
"Building a gas powered plant is the most affordable and reliable solution for our customers and complements our generation portfolio that includes coal, gas, wind, solar and oil," Zagzebski added.
IPL siad the new natural gas plant will generate about 650MW of electricity more efficiently and with fewer environmental emissions.
The CCGT is expected to reduce the rate of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and particulate matter emissions by over 98%.
The plant will also eliminate all mercury, lead and fluoride emissions, while reduce water use by 97%.
It will be located in Morgan County at IPL’s Eagle Valley Generating Station, five miles north of Martinsville.
Construction of the plant will create 660 jobs and 25 permanent positions in Martinsville, while the project will add over $1.6m per year into Morgan County through local tax revenue.
The overall economic benefit to the state during construction is more than $857m and another $48m per year during operation.
