Capital Spending at North American Coal-Fired Power Plants Strong with Over $14 Billion Scheduled to Kick-Off in 2004

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Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources, Incorporated; Houston, Texas). The U.S. and its neighbor to the North, Canada rely heavily on coal-fired generation capacity to meet demand. Approximately, 50 percent of the U.S. electrical generating capacity is produced from coal. Canada's generation capacity is somewhat less dependant on coal than the U.S. with around 19 percent supplied from coal mostly sourced in Western Canada. However, coal is the second largest contributor to Canadian power generation, second only to hydroelectric generation, which supplies around 60 percent of Canada's electricity. Coal consumption in both the U.S. and Canada has been on a steady rise in recent years, and that trend is expected to increase in the future as energy demand increases.

In 2004, capital and maintenance spending activity at coal-fired power plants in North America will be high due to the continuation of environmental compliance project activity and a refocus on maintenance work that had been delayed in 2003 and deferred to 2004.

Currently, there are about 410 active projects, representing $14 Billion in capital and maintenance spending, scheduled to kick-off in 2004 at North American coal-fired power plants. Twenty five percent of these projects are planned at plants in the Great Lakes Region (Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio). This region is looking at 109 projects representing $4.7 Billion.

Click on the image at right to view the 2004 North American Coal-Fired Power Plant Capital Spending by Region Chart.

The second largest region in terms of capital project value is Western Canada, which includes Alberta, Saskatchewan, and British Columbia. This region has thirteen projects representing about $2.5 Billion. The second largest region in terms of the number of projects is the Southeast Region with 56 projects representing $962 Million.

One of the larger projects currently scheduled to kick-off next year is the 800 megawatt grassroot Plum Point Coal-Fired power plant to be located in Osceola, Arkansas (PEC 20000701). Orginally conceived to include two pulverized coal boilers, the project has been downsized to one 800 megawatt unit. Current project timetable pegs construction kick-off in the Fall of 2004.

Most of the projects scheduled for 2004 will involve environmental upgrades to reduce NOx, SOx, and mercury emissions. For example a $30 million project (PEC 28000888) is planned for AmerenUE's 2,484 megawatt Labadie, Missouri power station to reduce mercury emissions. AmerenUE is a subsidiary of Ameren Corporation (NYSE: AEE) (St. Louis, Missouri).

One of the larger maintenance outages planned is a 56-day duration outage of the 414 megawatt coal-fired unit #4 at Cholla Power Station located in Joseph City, Arizona (PEC 43000373). The $8 million outage is scheduled for March of 2004.

Spending statistics based on Industrialinfo.com's project database measure the actual construction or outage kick-off date of the project. Project statistics represent only active status projects excluding those that have been placed on-hold, cancelled or delayed for future consideration.

For more power industry statistics, click here to view Industrialinfo.com's new 2004 Power Industry Forecast