Flooding Shuts Down More than 900 Megawatts of Power Generation Capacity in Iowa

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--According to the majority of power station owners surveyed across Iowa's hardest-hit flood areas, the extremely high floodwaters over the past two weeks have not forced them to take generating capacity offline. The reason cited most frequently is that the stations are "high and dry," alluding to the fact that these facilities were built at an elevation that would likely never be reached by waters wrought by heavy rains and/or breached levees. The civil engineers and land surveyors that planned site locations with flooding in mind should be thanked for a job well-done. However, more than 900 megawatts of capacity is offline because of the floodwaters.

In brief, civil engineers and land surveyors create maps of flood plains (and boundaries) dating back to the 1800s in the Midwest, marking historic flood levels over the past 150+ years, including the "Great Flood of 1993." That flood, said to be a once-in-a-lifetime event, affected the area less than the current flooding, according to residents of Iowa City (as noted by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources while touring the town). Apparently, the record markers put in place after that disaster are not even visible, making this an even more amazing occurrence when realizing that the levels in 1993 were all-time records themselves. This flood is being characterized as a "500-year flood" according to most preliminary estimates, and astonishingly, the waters may even be approaching 1000-year record levels. These two floods in less than two decades have caused extreme loss of life and property, and the waters are only now rising in Missouri and other states downriver from Iowa.

Companies with capacity offline due to the flood include Interstate Power &Light, a subsidiary of Alliant Energy Corporation (NYSE:LNT) (Madison, Wisconsin) with 600 megawatts offline, AmerenUE (NYSE:AEE) (Saint Louis, Missouri) with 125 megawatts offline, Cedar Falls Utilites with 100 megawatts offline, MidAmerican Energy Company, a Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK-A) company, with 80 megawatts offline, and Vinton Municipal Electric Utility with 20 megawatts offline. The timeframe for returning these plants to service depends upon the damage that has occurred, which will be assessed once the flooding has subsided. As it stands, some plants are stating they are hoping to return some of their units to service this week, while others say their stations may not be in operation until winter.

Having power, of course, doesn't ease the pain that the wrath that Nature can cause in such a short amount of time. Of course, having power is one less thing to worry about (and there would be big worries without it), but the loss of family, property, livelihoods, jobs and wondering what many will do next with no possessions is the real story here. Only time will tell what the outcome will be for many, but sometimes having such a small thing as a light to read or talk by can ease tensions and spark a little hope in an otherwise dire situation.

Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is a marketing information service specializing in industrial process, energy and financial related markets with products and services ranging from industry news, analytics, forecasting, plant and project databases, as well as multimedia services.