Glen Lyn Plant

Glen Lyn Plant is a coal-fired power station owned and operated by American Electric Power near Glen Lyn, Virginia.

Plant Data

 * Owner: Appalachian Power Company
 * Parent Company: American Electric Power
 * Plant Nameplate Capacity: 338 MW (Megawatts)
 * Units and In-Service Dates: 100 MW (1944), 238 MW (1957)
 * Location: 100 Apoco Rd., Glen Lyn, VA 24093
 * GPS Coordinates: 37.371389, -80.862222
 * Coal Consumption:
 * Coal Source:
 * Number of Employees:

Emissions Data

 * 2006 CO2 Emissions: 1,654,470 tons
 * 2006 SO2 Emissions:
 * 2006 SO2 Emissions per MWh:
 * 2006 NOx Emissions:
 * 2005 Mercury Emissions:

Proposed coal plant closures
On June 9, 2011, AEP announced that, based on impending EPA regulations as proposed, AEP’s compliance plan would retire nearly 6,000 megawatts (MW) of coal-fueled power generation; upgrade or install new advanced emissions reduction equipment on another 10,100 MW; refuel 1,070 MW of coal generation as 932 MW of natural gas capacity; and build 1,220 MW of natural gas-fueled generation. The cost of AEP’s compliance plan could range from $6 billion to $8 billion in capital investment through the end of the decade.

AEP’s current plan for compliance with the rules as proposed includes permanently retiring the following coal-fueled power plants:


 * Glen Lyn Plant, Glen Lyn, Va. – 335 MW (retired by Dec. 31, 2014);
 * Kammer Plant, Moundsville, W.Va. – 630 MW (retired by Dec. 31, 2014) (pictured above)
 * Kanawha River Plant, Glasgow, W.Va. – 400 MW (retired by Dec. 31, 2014);
 * Philip Sporn Power Plant, New Haven, W.Va. – 1,050 MW (450 MW expected to retire in 2011, 600 MW retired by Dec. 31, 2014); and
 * Picway Power Plant, Lockbourne, Ohio – 100 MW (retired by Dec. 31, 2014).

The shutdowns were announced in a June 9, 2011 press release in which AEP blamed the Environmental Protection Agency for the plant closures and said layoffs of 600 workers would result. The announcement set off a storm of controversy. The Wall Street Journal called it a result of "EPA's War on Jobs" and said: "The real goal of the EPA's rule is to shut down fossil fuel electric power in the name of climate change. The consensus estimate in the private sector is that the utility rule and eight others on the EPA docket will force the retirement of 60 out of the country's current 340 gigawatts of coal-fired capacity." The New York Times took a different view: "This is a deceptive and particularly cynical claim... These units are, on average, 55 years old. Some are running at only 5 percent of capacity. Many had long been slated for retirement, in part to comply with a 2007 settlement with the George W. Bush administration in which the company agreed to settle violations of the Clean Air Act by spending $4.7 billion to retire or retrofit aging units."

Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Glen Lyn Plant
In 2010, Abt Associates issued a study commissioned by the Clean Air Task Force, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, quantifying the deaths and other health effects attributable to fine particle pollution from coal-fired power plants. Fine particle pollution consists of a complex mixture of soot, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. Among these particles, the most dangerous are those less than 2.5 microns in diameter, which are so tiny that they can evade the lung's natural defenses, enter the bloodstream, and be transported to vital organs. Impacts are especially severe among the elderly, children, and those with respiratory disease. The study found that over 13,000 deaths and tens of thousands of cases of chronic bronchitis, acute bronchitis, asthma, congestive heart failure, acute myocardial infarction, dysrhythmia, ischemic heart disease, chronic lung disease, and pneumonia each year are attributable to fine particle pollution from U.S. coal plant emissions. These deaths and illnesses are major examples of coal's external costs, i.e. uncompensated harms inflicted upon the public at large. Low-income and minority populations are disproportionately impacted as well, due to the tendency of companies to avoid locating power plants upwind of affluent communities. To monetize the health impact of fine particle pollution from each coal plant, Abt assigned a value of $7,300,000 to each 2010 mortality, based on a range of government and private studies. Valuations of illnesses ranged from $52 for an asthma episode to $440,000 for a case of chronic bronchitis.

Table 1: Death and disease attributable to fine particle pollution from Glen Lyn Plant
Source: "Find Your Risk from Power Plant Pollution," Clean Air Task Force interactive table, accessed February 2011

Coal Ash Waste and Water Contamination
In August 2010 a study released by the Environmental Integrity Project, the Sierra Club and Earthjustice reported that Virginia, along with 34 states, had significant groundwater contamination from coal ash that was not regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The report, in an attempt to pressure the EPA to regulate coal ash, noted that most states do not monitor drinking water contamination levels near waste disposal sites. The report mentioned Virginia's Clinch River Plant and Glen Lyn Plant as two sites that have groundwater contamination due to coal ash waste.

Coal Waste Sites

 * Glen Lyn Plant Bottom Ash Pond
 * Glen Lyn Plant Fly Ash Pond

Other coal waste sites
To see a nationwide list of over 350 coal waste sites in the United States, click here. To see a listing of coal waste sites in a particular state, click on the map:



Citizen groups

 * Appalachian Voices
 * Blue Ridge Earth First
 * Concerned Citizens of Giles County
 * Do Something Charlottesville
 * Chesapeake Climate Action Virginia
 * Mountain Justice Blacksburg
 * Sierra Club Virginia Chapter
 * Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards
 * Virginia Tech Beyond Coal
 * Wise Energy for Virginia

Related SourceWatch Articles

 * Existing U.S. Coal Plants
 * Virginia and coal
 * American Electric Power
 * United States and coal
 * Global warming
 * Coal