KCP&L breaks ground on a novel structure for billion-dollar plant investments.
Scott M. Gawlicki, based in West Hartford, Conn., has been writing about the power industry for nearly 20 years. Contact him at sgawlicki@excite.com.
To the casual observer, the Iatan 2 power plant under construction in Platte County. Mo., is simply another coal-fired facility.
However, when viewed by a utility executive facing seemingly non-stop global-warming headlines and news broadcasts, the 850 MW Iatan 2 looks more like a new regulatory and business model for building coal burners.
A consortium of utilities in the greater Kansas City area is building the plant, which is slated to begin pumping out electricity in 2010. For its majority owner, Great Plains Energy subsidiary Kansas City Power & Light (KCP&L), Iatan 2 is the cornerstone of a $1 billion-plus expansion program.
Known as the Comprehensive Energy Plan (CEP), the program boosts KCP&L’s generating capacity while also lowering the utility’s emissions profile through energy efficiency, renewable energy, and new equipment investments. The plan took a major step forward in September, when Great Plains sold $100 million in bonds for building the new facilities, especially Iatan 2.