SPP: Clean Power Plan goals will be difficult to reach through any route
Southwest Power Pool (SPP) has, for the second time, analyzed the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Clean Power Plan (CPP), and found that it would cost $2.9 billion per year in generation-resource capital investment and energy production costs to meet the 2030 deadline in a regional compliance approach.
“SPP’s latest analysis of the CPP’s impact on its footprint focused on regional compliance efforts,” said SPP in a statement. “The regional transmission organization applied a carbon-cost adder (as a tax on each fossil unit’s CO2 emissions) and added it to existing resource plans. SPP’s assessment found an adder between $30-45 per ton would be the most cost-effective in a regional approach.”
SPP also found that up to 13,900 megawatts (MW) of coal-fired generation may need to retire in order to meet the plan’s requirements.
