Saturday, September 23, 2000
Second electric facility studied
Duke Energy considers additional generator
By Mike Boyer
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Duke Energy Corp. is considering a second $200 million merchant power plant adjacent to an identical generating plant opened this summer in Butler County's Madison Township.
The natural gas-fired plant, which would produce electricity during periods of high demand, would be located on 36 acres near Cinergy Corp.'s Woodsdale power plant and Duke Energy's Madison I plant, south of Trenton.
Kate Perez, a spokeswoman for Duke Energy North America, Duke's power plant development arm, said the company hasn't made a final decision to go ahead with the project, but expects to decide early next year.
She said the Madison site is one of more than a dozen sites the company has under study to fill the Midwest's need for new electric generating capacity.
So-called merchant power plants don't produce power for a specific utility or set of customers but generate power which they sell on the wholesale power market.
Duke would expect to receive approval to build the 640-megawatt generating plant by next summer and begin operation by the summer of 2002, according to a filing with the Ohio Power Siting Board, which reviews requests for generating stations.
One megawatt is enough electricity to serve at least 200 homes for a year.
Like Duke's first merchant plant in Madison Township, the new facility would consist of eight General Electric turbines each capable of producing 80 megawatts of electricity. The plant would employ a handful of workers once in operation, but would require 200 to 400 workers during construction.
Ms. Perez said Duke officials have already presented their proposed plan to Madison Township residents in an informal meeting and were pleased with the local response.
The new Duke plant would join a growing list of merchant power plants in the region.
Cinergy, which has acquired a half-interest in the first Duke Madison plant as part of an invest ment in three Midwest facilities planned by Duke, has also proposed building similar gas-fired peaking plants west of the Brent Spence Bridge in Queensgate and in Erlanger.
Public Service Enterprise Group of Newark, N.J. is also planning to build a 500-megawatt peaking plant in Lawrenceburg.
Ohio utility regulators have approved or have pending more than a dozen such merchant power plants aimed at filling the state's need for electricity.
Generating capacity in the East Central Area Reliability Region, a multi-state area which includes Ohio, is projected to increase by 14,100 megawatts by 2007 to meet new power demand. Some 10,000 megawatts of that new generation is expected to come from merchant plants, Duke said in its filing with the Power Siting Board.
Duke said it has two sites under consideration in Madison Township, just west of the Cinergy Woodsdale plant. Both sides are less than a mile from a Texas Eastern Gas Transmission pipeline, owned by Duke.
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