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Despite several ice storms in the capital city that
knocked out electricity for thousands of customers of Springfield’s
City Water, Light & Power — the most recent last weekend —
utility officials say that construction of a new power plant is continuing
on schedule. According to project manager Brian Fitzgerald, Mother
Nature has been both a burden and a boon for the plant’s construction
schedule. Although nasty weather has at times slowed the workers down,
Fitzgerald says that last month’s unseasonably warm temperatures
speeded work along at an unexpected rate. Right now, the site of Springfield’s future
200-megawatt coal-fired power plant isn’t much to look at: a pair of
cranes, a half-dozen cement trucks, about 80 workers, and several large
holes in the ground. But when work on the plant is complete —
sometime in late 2009 or early 2010 — Springfield’s skyline
will feature an additional smokestack — yet there’ll be less
pollution.
To be precise, there will be 99 percent less sulfur
dioxide and 90 percent fewer mercury emissions than those given off by the
existing plant, making the proposed facility one of the cleanest-burning
power plants in the Midwest. An extra scrubber, or flue-gas desulfurization
system, will be installed to remove sulfur dioxide. A byproduct of that
process is gypsum, which the utility sells for use in wallboard and
concrete, says plant manager John Davis. On a given day, 50,000 tons of Illinois coal is on
hand, ready to be burned in the boilers at the current facility. Two
hundred dump trucks, each carrying 25 tons of coal, pass through
CWLP’s gates, on the shores of Lake Springfield. In the summer, 4,000
tons of coal is burned each day. The new plant, Springfield’s first in 30 years,
will generate more power per ton of coal used than the existing facility. The new half-billion-dollar Dallman IV generator,
named in honor of former Illinois State
Register editor V.Y. Dallman, will be
funded with a series of three rate increases totaling 34 percent.
Contact R.L. Nave at rnave@illinoistimes.com
This article appears in Jan 11-17, 2007.
