GAS POWER Direct

The world has firmly crossed into the “Age of Electricity.” That is a unifying finding in the International Energy Agency’s (IEA’s) 2025 edition of the World Energy Outlook (WEO), which shows a global

Utilities regulators in Maryland are prepared to expedite reviews of two natural gas-fired power plants proposed by Baltimore-based Constellation Energy. The state’s Public Service Commission on December 30 issued a 14-page order in which the group approved Constellation’s request to fast-track the facilities in the regulatory process.

Officials from both Egypt and Lebanon have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to deliver Egyptian natural gas to the Deir Ammar power plant in Lebanon.

Entergy Arkansas, the utility that provides electricity to about 735,000 customers in 63 counties in that state, announced a plan to add about 2.6 GW of new power generation capacity, in part by converting old coal-fired units to burn natural gas. It also is renewing the operating license for the 1.8-GW Arkansas Nuclear One power plant, the state’s only nuclear power station, with plans to invest in new equipment that would increase the facility’s output.

The lone remaining coal-fired power plant in the state of Washington will shut down at the end of December, and will be converted to burn natural gas. Operator TransAlta Corp. on December 9 signed an agreement with Puget Sound Energy (PSE) for the transition, with a 16-year, fixed-price contract for the gas-fired generation that runs through 2044.

Utilities that provide natural gas to customers are investing in smart technologies to modernize their infrastructure. These measures are leading to better efficiency in gas delivery, while also enhancing safety measures along their delivery networks.

Idaho Falls Power celebrated the formal launch of a new natural gas-fired peaking generation plant on December 4, calling the occasion a “major milestone” in its 125-year history.

The Department of Energy (DOE) extended its run of federal grid interventions into winter over the past week, issuing a Section 202(c) emergency order on Nov. 18 for Consumers Energy’s 1,420-MW J.H. Campbell coal plant in Michigan and another on Nov. 25 for Constellation’s 760-MW Eddystone Units 3 and 4 in southeastern Pennsylvania in a […]

In its recently released Winter Reliability Assessment, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) found that while resources are adequate for normal winter peak demand, large swaths of North America face an elevated risk of electricity shortfalls during prolonged, wide-area cold snaps. Noting that four severe Arctic storms have swept across much of the continent since […]

NRG Energy is the latest Texas-based utility to receive a loan agreement from the Texas Energy Fund (TxEF). The company plans to use the funding to support construction of a 455-MW natural gas-fired station at the site of the group’s current Greens Bayou Generating Station in Harris County, near Houston.

An energy research group said U.S. power generation capacity will be led by solar power in the short term, natural gas in the mid term, and nuclear power in the long term as coal-fired units continue to be retired.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has signed off on NRG Energy’s plan to acquire nearly 13 GW of natural gas-fired power generation. The agency on November 13 said it supports Houston, Texas-based NRG’s $12-billion deal with New York-based LS Power for capacity in the PJM market territory.

Global investment group and asset manager Blackstone said it will support construction of a 600-MW combined-cycle natural gas-fired power plant in West Virginia. The Wolf Summit Energy facility, which will feature GE Vernova equipment, is affiliated with Old Dominion Electric Cooperative, which serves about 1.5 million customers across three states.

Opponents of a planned methane gas power plant on a floating barge off the coast of Louisiana were successful in moving Entergy Louisiana to cancel the project. Earthjustice in a news release sent to POWER said the group represented the Alliance for Affordable Energy in opposition to the proposed 112-MW Bayou Power Station.

The Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) has executed its first agreement under the Texas Energy Fund (TxEF) Completion Bonus Grant (CBG) Program, awarding the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) up to $22.56 million for its 188-MW Timmerman Power Plant Unit 1, a new natural gas–fired plant in Caldwell County, Texas. The agreement marks the operational launch of Texas’s performance-contingent funding mechanism, which is designed to accelerate […]

CyrusOne’s Jim Roche details how AI-driven workloads, high-density racks, and liquid cooling are transforming the data center–utility relationship. Only a decade ago, few in the power sector could have predicted that the digital economy’s engine—the data center—would become a central concern for utility planners, grid operators, and energy policymakers. For much of its history, data […]

A Texas-based developer and operator of next-generation digital infrastructure and integrated power assets announced it has entered into a land option purchase agreement for a site in New Mexico that would feature a vast data center center campus. The plan announced November 6 calls for more than 2 GW of natural gas-fired generation capacity, and 5 GW or more of nuclear power, to energize the 3,500-acre site.

The explosive growth of cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and enterprise data storage has transformed data centers into the critical infrastructure of the digital economy. Yet their extraordinary and continuous electricity demands—often exceeding 100 megawatts per site—have made energy access and reliability the single most consequential factor in determining where these facilities are built. Across the […]

Energy development group Maple Creek Energy LLC said it has secured an agreement to purchase a GE Vernova 7HA.03 gas turbine in a single-shaft configuration, along with associated services, for the company’s 640-MW Maple Creek natural gas-fired power project in Sullivan County, Indiana.

Austria-headquartered INNIO Group said the company has received the largest equipment order by power delivery in its history. The company on October 21 said it has a deal with VoltaGrid for a 2.3-GW power infrastructure project featuring 92 of INNIO’s power packs, each with 25 MW of generation capacity.

Google has signed a first-of-its-kind corporate offtake agreement to purchase power from a new 400-MW natural gas–fired cogeneration plant outfitted with carbon capture and storage (CCS) in Decatur, Illinois. In an Oct. 23 blog post, Michael Terrell, head of Google’s Advanced Energy division, unveiled the corporate agreement that will allow the hyperscaler to purchase power […]

Entergy Mississippi announced plans to build a 754-MW combined-cycle natural gas-fired power plant in Vicksburg. The $1.2-billion Vicksburg Advanced Power Station will replace the former Baxter Wilson Steam Electric Station, as part of the utility’s Superpower Mississippi strategy.

Technology group Wärtsilä has signed an operation and maintenance (O&M) agreement with an outcome-based performance model, covering three power plants owned by Brazilian Âmbar Energia, the energy company of J&F Group. The five-year agreement announced October 23 combines Wärtsilä’s services with clearly defined performance targets to establish a framework that enables the power plants to […]

Texas-based rapid-deployment power specialist VoltaGrid will deploy 2,300 MW of modular, ultra-low-emissions natural gas generation to support Oracle Cloud Infrastructure’s (OCI’s) artificial intelligence (AI) data centers, backed by firm fuel from Energy Transfer’s 140,000-mile pipeline and storage network. Under the collaboration announced Oct. 15, VoltaGrid said its proprietary modular platform—featuring INNIO Jenbacher reciprocating engines and […]

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.