GAS POWER Direct

FirstEnergy Corp. has submitted a plan to build a new 1,200-MW natural gas-fired combined-cycle power plant to serve customers in West Virginia. The company recently filed an Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) with state regulators that also calls for keeping two major coal-fired power plants in West Virginia operating at least through the next decade.

America’s investor-owned electric companies are poised to deploy record-setting investment to launch one of the most aggressive infrastructure modernization campaigns in industry history in a bid to confront unprecedented electricity demand growth and prepare for a fundamentally transformed energy landscape. In total, over the next five years, the industry is poised to invest more than […]

Duke Energy announced plans to build more natural gas-fired generation capacity and look at nuclear power in order to meet the increased demand for power in its Carolinas service territory. The utility also said it will delay the retirement of some coal-fired facilities as it seeks to increase the supply of electricity for data centers and manufacturing plants.

Xcel Energy is adding more natural gas-fired power generation in Texas, with plans to convert a retiring coal-fired plant to natural gas, along with building a new peaker plant to provide electricity at times of high demand.

The Great Plains Power Station in Saskatchewan supports SaskPower’s effort to add generation capacity in support of the province’s rapidly growing industrial sector.

Back in 2015, ground broke on a combined heat and power (CHP) facility in Florida. It was created as a partnership between Chesapeake Utilities Corp., its Florida Public Utilities (FPU) subsidiary, and Rayonier Advanced Materials Inc. (RYAM), and comprised a Solar Titan 250 gas turbine and a Rentech heat recovery steam generator (HRSG). Ten years on, how is the $40 million facility doing, how has the partnership worked out, and what lessons have been learned along the way? POWER magazine took a trip to the plant to answer those questions.

In Brazil’s industrial heartland, a pioneering energy project has earned a POWER Top Plant award for turning hydrogen-rich waste into clean, reliable power. The Vesta Cogeneration Plant not only boosts

Taiwan’s energy transition faces a unique challenge: powering its world-leading semiconductor industry while phasing out nuclear power and reducing coal dependence. Part of the solution emerged from an unlikely location—a former pineapple field in Tainan—where engineers built what has been recognized as a POWER Top Plant award-winning facility critical to the island’s energy future.

Southeast Asia’s first-ever JAC gas turbines are now supplying power to Thailand’s grid. With efficiency greater than 64%, the eight units deployed—four each at the Sriracha Power Plant in Chonburi and the Pluak Daeng Power Plant in Rayong—are worthy recipients of a POWER Top Plant award.

LandBridge Co., a Permian-focused land and infrastructure firm with 277,000 surface acres in the Delaware sub-region in Texas, and NRG Energy, one of the U.S.’s largest independent power producers, have inked a strategic agreement for a potential 1,100 MW natural gas–fired generation facility in Reeves County, Texas, to power a hyperscale data center. The agreement, […]

Japanese utility giant JERA and automotive technology firm DENSO have begun Japan’s first demonstration of hydrogen production using solid oxide electrolysis cell (SOEC) systems at JERA’s Shin-Nagoya Thermal Power Station in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, a 3,058 MW combined-cycle LNG facility. The demonstration tests 200-kW SOEC water electrolysis systems developed by DENSO with the key aim […]

Blackstone, the world’s largest alternative asset manager, said its energy-focused private equity business has a deal to buy the 620-MW natural gas-fired Hill Top Energy Center in Pennsylvania. The agreement announced September 15 will see Blackstone Energy Transition Partners acquire the power station from Ardian, a global private investment firm. Blackstone officials said the purchase […]

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has issued new guidance under its New Source Review (NSR) preconstruction permitting program that could allow power plant developers to begin certain non-emissions‐related site work—such as installing concrete pads, grading, and utility trenching—before obtaining a Clean Air Act construction permit. The change, described in a sparse set of paragraphs […]

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) is prepared to double its production capacity for gas turbines within the next two years as demand for the technology continues to increase. Eisaku Ito, the company’s CEO, on August 29 said turbine orders are growing rapidly as demand for equipment rises, in part due to the need for more power […]

The Trump administration’s unprecedented use of emergency grid authorities entered a second phase in August 2025, as the Department of Energy (DOE) extended three critical reliability orders. The measures signal that this year’s historic string of federal interventions—staked in Section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act—are likely to continue beyond the traditional summer peak and […]

An energy infrastructure company said it’s moving forward with the GW Ranch project, an off-grid complex in Texas that will combine natural gas-fired generation and battery energy storage to provide nearly 7 GW of power in Pecos County. The campus, sited on more than 8,000 acres, is designed “to support hyperscale data centers and the […]

Regulators in North Dakota have given their approval for a 1,490-MW natural gas-fired power plant, a combined-cycle station that Basin Electric Power Cooperative officials said would provide the area with its first new baseload electric output in more than four decades. South Dakota utility commissioners, meanwhile, are set to consider an application for a smaller, […]

Global energy giant BP said it would cut thousands more jobs by the end of this year, as the company continues to reduce its renewable energy plans to focus more on its longtime core business of oil and gas production. UK-based BP, which has its U.S. headquarters in Houston, Texas, has said it plans to […]

The Department of Energy (DOE) has issued its fifth 202(c) emergency order this year, directing PJM Interconnection to override environmental limits and dispatch an oil-fired power generating unit in Maryland strictly as needed to avert possible blackouts in the Baltimore region. The July 28 order, issued under Section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act, authorizes […]

Capacity prices in PJM Interconnection’s latest auction spiked to the market’s price ceiling, hitting $329.17/MW-day across the board for the 2026/2027 delivery year—the maximum allowed under new Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) rules. The regional transmission organization’s (RTO’s) competitive Base Residual Auction (BRA), conducted on July 9, 2025, and released on July 22, secured 134,311 […]

PPL Corp. and investment giant Blackstone Infrastructure have formed a joint venture to build, own, and operate natural gas combined-cycle generation plants in Pennsylvania specifically designed to serve data center loads through long-term energy service agreements (ESAs). The partnership, unveiled at the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit in Pittsburgh on July 15, represents a strategic […]

The Georgia Public Service (PSC) Commission has unanimously approved Georgia Power’s 2025 Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), authorizing a massive energy expansion to accommodate what the utility calls “extraordinary” growth in electricity demand. The PSC’s approval on July 15 allows the Southern Co. subsidiary to proceed with major capacity extensions at its flagship coal, gas, and […]

The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) has approved a landmark tariff structure requiring large new data center customers to pay for a minimum of 85% of their subscribed electricity usage—regardless of actual consumption—for up to 12 years. The measure marks a pivotal step in Ohio’s efforts to address surging demand from hyperscale data centers […]

Kansas regulators have given Evergy the go-ahead to raise the utility’s rates to help finance construction of two new natural gas-fired power plants, along with a utility-scale solar power project, in the state.

Private equity firm ArcLight Capital Partners has entered into definitive agreements to acquire 100% of the economic interests in the 484-MW Middletown Energy Center, a combined cycle natural gas power plant in Butler County, Ohio. The firm said on July 10 that the acquisition—structured through a series of transactions with a consortium of sellers—adds a […]

The U.S. power sector seems to be increasingly pulled in two directions. While trundling toward rapid electrification, it is seeking to hold its ground on recent decarbonization triumphs. And while utilities and power companies are racing to add generation capacity, their prospects are limited by aging infrastructure and upended by supply chain constraints that have […]

GE Vernova said the first of three blocks of a major natural gas-fired power plant in Taiwan is now online. The company on July 7 said the first 1.3-GW unit of the Hsinta power station is operating, part of the facility’s transition from burning coal to using natural gas.

A utility that serves customers in Missouri announced it plans to build an 800-MW natural gas-fired power plant, along with the company’s first large-scale battery energy storage facility, at a site near St. Louis.

Taiwan is among several countries experiencing an energy crisis, with its supply of power struggling to keep up with demand from a rapidly growing high-tech sector. The country has long depended on imported

Artificial intelligence (AI) is playing a huge role in heat rate optimization. In some cases, AI-driven models have analyzed operational data to recommend control settings that reduce heat rates by 1.5% to