Big returns frequently require big risks. But taking carefully calculated risks increases the odds of winning, as the construction of Wisconsin Public Service Corp.’s 595-MW (gross) Weston 4 demonstrates.
Weston 4 is among the few next-generation supercritical projects expected to enter service in the U.S. this decade (Figure 1). Wisconsin Public Service Corp. (WPSC) selected the supercritical pulverized coal design for all the right reasons: life-cycle economics, the lowest practical emissions, and technology that has proven itself in decades of service. The $750 million Weston 4 will provide reliable and cost-competitive power for the utility’s retail and wholesale market customers for its 40-year design life and beyond.
1. Flagship station. Wisconsin Public Service Corp.’s 530-MW Weston 4 wins the “clean coal technology” trifecta by using low-sulfur subbituminous Powder River Basin coal, state-of-the-art air quality control systems, and supercritical combustion technology. Weston 4 began commercial operation on June 30, 2008. Courtesy: Wisconsin Public Service Corp.
The importance of Weston 4 was succinctly identified at the beginning of the project when WPSC CEO Larry Weyers said, “We are not just betting the back forty on Weston 4, we are betting the entire farm!”
Weston 4: Leading the coal resurgence
Weston 4 is jointly owned by WPSC, the principal owner and operator, with 70%, and Dairyland Power Corp. (DPC), participating as a 30% owner. WPSC, headquartered in Green Bay, Wisconsin, serves more than 400,000 electric customers in northeastern and central Wisconsin and in a small adjacent portion of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. WPSC electrical generation facilities comprise fossil, hydroelectric, 335 MW of contract nuclear power from the Kewaunee Power Station that WPSC sold to Dominion in 2005, and wind-generating plants, for a total of 2,736 MW. DPC, headquartered in La Crosse, is a wholesale power generator for 25 electric distribution cooperatives and 20 municipal utilities located in the western half of Wisconsin, southeast Minnesota, northeast Iowa, and northwest Illinois. DPC’s installed generating capacity is 1,225 MW, including its portion of Weston 4.
The need for more power generation was critical for this fast-growing region. According to Philip Hayes, WPSC’s project manager for the Weston 4 project, “WPSC forecasted a shortfall of baseload generation ranging from 350 MW to 650 MW in 2002 attributable to increased customer demand. Further, our baseload plant capacity totaled 1,585 MW, and eight of our 13 units were commissioned between 1943 and 1960. Compounding the problem was limited transmission access. Our only solution was to build more baseload generation where it was needed.”
The Weston project is part of a small but notable uptick in coal-fired generation. The latest National Energy Technology Laboratory coal-fired power plant database (as of February 2008) lists 47 coal-fired projects, totaling 23 GW, near or under construction or well down the road to obtaining the necessary permits. Twenty-eight of those are under construction, representing almost 15 GW. That doesn’t sound like a lot when compared with the total U.S. installed coal-fired capacity of 336 GW, but it’s much improved when compared to the flat-line average of 1 GW per year installed from the mid-1990s through 2007. U.S. historic peaks were in 1975 and 1981, with just over 15 GW of coal-fired capacity entering service in both of those years. I wouldn’t call it a full-blown coal renaissance, but at least the trend is positive.
The Weston Power Plant, which sits on a 345-acre site near Wausau, is a microcosm of the coal-fired power industry. The 60-MW Weston 1 was built in 1954. It was followed by the 90-MW Weston 2 in 1960. In 1981, the same year as the last U.S. spike in new coal-fired generation, the conventional pulverized coal-fired 360-MW Weston 3 began commercial service.
Weston 4, with state-of-the-art performance, technology, and environmental systems, began commercial service on June 30, 2008, and was released to MISO on July 1. Hayes told POWER that, “By bringing Weston 4 into our baseload portfolio, WPSC will be able to keep electric rates lower and more stable for our customers. Weston 4, along with the recently completed 345-kV transmission line from Duluth, Minnesota, to central Wisconsin will give our customers access to very competitively priced capacity and energy for many years to come.”
Table 1. Major project milestones for Wisconsin Public Service Corp.’s Weston 4. Source: Wisconsin Public Service Corp.
Weston 4 also participated in the growing industry trend of lengthening planning cycles: Construction began on October 21, 2004, and was followed by a groundbreaking ceremony on November 8, 2004—two years after the first public announcement of the project. Weston 4 was six years in the making (Table 1).
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