Michigan’s first new utility built power plant in 25 years was fired up today in Lansing.
The Reo Town power plant’s natural gas powered turbines whirled to life this morning.
The $182 million plant will generate electricity and steam for Lansing Board of Water and Light customers. The plant will generate up to 300,000 pounds of steam for 225 steam customers in downtown Lansing and will completely replace BWL’s Moores Park Steam Plant. It also will provide 100 megawatts of electricity, about 20 percent of the utility's electric generation.
The new plant will replace half the electricity generated by a coal-fired power plant just a few blocks away.
Peter Lark is BWL’s general manager. He says the new power plant uses state of the art technology and reduces mercury and other emissions.
“That combination makes the REO Town plant among the cleanest and most efficient operating in the United States today,” Lark said this morning.
Lark says the new power plant brings BWL in line with President Obama’s call to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 17%, well before the president’s 2020 deadline.
