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9 August 2006 -- American Electric Power's Southwestern Electric Power Company (SWEPCO) today announced the proposed site selection for a new baseload power plant designed to meet the long-term generation demands. The new coal-fueled plant should be operational by the summer of 2011 at a 2,800-acre location north of Fulton, Ark. in Hempstead County, about 15 miles northeast of Texarkana, Ark. The proposed 600-MW plant will create between 1,000-1,400 construction jobs and bring an estimated 110 permanent jobs to the area.
The Hempstead plant will use an advanced clean coal combustion technology called ultra-super critical, making it one of the first plants of its type to go into operation in the United States. Ultra-super critical generation is a pulverized coal technology requiring less coal and creating fewer emissions to produce the same amount of power as existing plants using Powder River Basin coal from Wyoming.
The cost of the Hempstead county plant is approximately $1.3 billion, of which SWEPCO's investment will be about 75 percent.
"SWEPCO believes a coal-fueled plant is the best choice for new baseload generation to fuel the future growth of the economies in our region, allow us to remain a low-cost provider, and prevent over-reliance on natural gas for electricity generation," said Nick Akins, president and chief operating officer of SWEPCO.
One other potential site was considered for the new coal plant: the company's lignite-fired Henry W. Pirkey Power Plant near Hallsville, Texas.
"We evaluated both of these locations based on a number of factors, including the impact on the environment, available transmission, adaptation to generating technologies, and accommodation of unit size, before choosing the Hempstead County location," Akins said.
Construction will begin once necessary regulatory approvals are obtained. Filings will be made in SWEPCO's three-state service area of Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas. SWEPCO has an option to purchase the land where the plant will be built.
Akins said that Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) technology would not be possible at the Hempstead location because the coal used in the SWEPCO region requires different IGCC technology than what other current AEP IGCC project in the eastern United States use and would not be guaranteed to perform as well as the other IGCC units. SWEPCO's fuel mix is expected to remain at 85 percent solid fuel and 15 percent natural gas once all three construction projects are completed, maintaining the company's favorable fuel costs.
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