Renew Big Sandy

Are you a customer of Kentucky Power / American Electric Power? 

Your voice is needed to speak up for a bright future for Eastern Kentucky. 

You can advocate for a plan that will create a just transition to build strong and healthy communities and create good jobs as American Electric Power (AEP) plans to shut down the Big Sandy coal-burning power plant near Louisa which supplies electricity to Kentucky Power customers.

Click here for tips and talking points.

In order to comply with new clean air standards by 2015, American Electric Power has put forth a request to the Kentucky Public Service Commission to shut down their coal-burning Big Sandy power plant. Originally, AEP had requested to retrofit the Big Sandy plant with pollution controls at the cost of nearly $1 billion to ratepayers in order to keep producing coal power at that location. They withdrew that request in May. Now, the proposal on which the Public Service Commission is taking comments consists of shutting down the Big Sandy plant and spending $536 million to buy a 50% share in a coal-burning power plant in West Virginia. This is estimated to raise utility bills by 8%.

These are not the only choices that should be put before Kentucky Power customers and eastern Kentuckians. There is a better way.

Eastern Kentuckians deserve a plan that will build a bright future and provide a just transition.

It is important that AEP reduce pollution from the Big Sandy plant, but they have a moral obligation to the region to invest in good jobs that will increase public health and make our communities stronger. AEP can meet their energy needs through local and regional energy efficiency and renewable energy projects, and land remediation in the eastern Kentucky region. They should provide job training and transition for laid-off plant employees, and develop a community fund that will be used to create new jobs.

KFTC members and friends are encouraged to attend the public meetings and encourage the PSC to demand a proposal from AEP that will economically benefit the region with good local jobs while transitioning to a clean and healthy energy future. See location and time information about the meetings in the right column.

If you cannot attend the meetings, you can submit written comments until May 29. Written comments will also be accepted at the meetings, by email from the Public Service Commission website, PSC.ky.gov or mailed to P.O. Box 615, Frankfort, Ky. 40602.

Here is the press release from the Public Service Commission on the public hearings, and here is the full list of documents in the PSC case.

Click here to download complete suggested tips and talking points for speaking at one of the public meetings on the Big Sandy power plant.

Talking Points

If you attend the meetings, here are some key points to make. (Full tips and talking points here): 

We are in an important moment but are being presented with a false choice

The new clean air standards are coming and AEP must do something to meet them. This is an important moment of choice for the power company; the choice they make, and that the Public Service Commission allows them to make, will have deep and long-lasting effects on our region.

However, what has been presented to us is a false choice. We do not need to choose between shutting down the plant while spending more than half a billion dollars to ship the jobs to another state or paying almost double that, while significantly raising our rates, to keep the jobs burning coal at the Big Sandy plant.

There is a better way. 
 

Eastern Kentuckians deserve a bright future and a just transition

For decades American Electric Power has made enormous profit from the hard work, the people, the infrastructure, and the public health of our communities and region. As AEP is looking to transition to producing electricity in less harmful ways, the corporation has a moral obligation to the region to invest in good jobs that will increase public health and make our communities stronger. 

AEP can: 

• create good, local jobs as well as meet their energy demands and our energy needs through local and regional energy efficiency and renewable energy projects

Investment in energy efficiency programs for ratepayers would be the lowest cost option for communities. A study in 2009 in Kentucky stated that a program of energy efficiency and local renewable energy generation could create thousands more jobs than building and running a new coal-burning power plant, and at a lower cost. If AEP were serious about working to save their customers energy and save money on their bills, and getting a much larger percentage of their power from clean sources, they could put thousands of people to work throughout their service area at jobs that can’t be outsourced.

Download the study from 2009 here.
 

• develop land remediation programs and jobs in the eastern Kentucky region 

AEP can hire local workers to clean up the site at the Big Sandy plant once it is decommissioned. AEP can also train and hire workers to improve abandoned mine lands in the area where the coal was mined that supplied the plant for decades.

You can learn more about one example of a community based land remediation project here.
 

• provide job training and transition for laid-off plant employees

AEP owes it to the workers at the plant and the community to provide good benefits and job training for the workers at the plant.
 

• develop a community fund or foundation that will pay to create jobs right here in our region 

The Public Service Commission needs to look into requiring that AEP use the sulfur dioxide pollution credits they will be saving with the closure of the power plant to invest in the community, rather than to line the pockets of the share holders. AEP can create a fund with these credits that they sell on the market which in turn can be used to create the new jobs listed above and other local economic opportunities. The PSC and AEP should research the model of the Mohave coal-burning power plant on the Navajo reservation in New Mexico. The Public Service Commission was a key decision maker in that deal, and the local communities are now looking forward to a just transition with the shut down of the local power plant and coal mine.

Check out these articles here and here to learn more about the Navajo Just Transition efforts that are being funding by pollution credits from a utility that shut down a local power plant.