Press Releases

Energy Solutions

The Prairie State Energy Campus will be a 1,600 megawatt supercritical power plant fueled by an adjacent coal mine. Prairie State will be sited near Lively Grove, Ill., and will use a selection of advanced technologies, making it among the cleanest U.S. coal-fueled power plants, with as little as one-fifth the regulated emission rates of U.S. coal plants. Its carbon dioxide emission rate would be approximately 15 percent lower than the typical U.S. coal plant.

Coal-fueled electricity is increasingly important for energy security and has helped avoid a U.S. energy crisis by fueling more than 50 percent of our electricity, more than all other sources combined. U.S. generating capacity reserve margins have greatly declined in recent years, and demand is expected to exceed growth by a three-to-one margin over the next decade.

In May 2007, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission warned that consumers face a 20 to 30 percent increase in electricity prices this summer due to rising natural gas prices. Coal fuels electricity at a fraction of the cost of other fuels and is expected to represent 57 percent of U.S. electricity by 2030.

Prairie State has six equity partners and will generate energy solutions for 1.7 million families in Illinois, Missouri, Indiana and Kentucky. Peabody also continues late stage discussions with other potential partners and expects one or more major partners to be added.

Environmental Care

Prairie State will create a next generation model for clean electricity from coal, designed with the latest scrubbing systems that will remove 99.9 percent of particulates and 98 percent of the plant's sulfur dioxide emissions.

The advanced scrubbing system provides the highest removal rate of any permitted plant, and Prairie State is equipped with three particulate removal systems, versus one in most plants. Prairie State enjoys support from more than 80 percent of area residents.

Economic Progress

The $2.9 billion Prairie State Energy Campus is the largest private capital project planned for Illinois, injecting more than $560 million into the regional economy during development. Prairie State will create more than 450 permanent jobs and approximately 2,000 skilled jobs at the peak of a four- year construction process.

Prairie State will begin electricity generation in the 2011 to 2012 time frame, and is expected to contribute nearly $100 million in economic benefits to the region, based on a study by Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

Site preparation is moving forward at the future home of Prairie State, with preliminary foundation testing under way, expected to be completed by the end of June.

Engineering, Procurement and Construction Management(EPCM) contractor Bechtel Power Corporation has signed an agreement with the Southwestern Illinois Business and Construction Trades Council for plant construction. Initial craft hiring will begin this summer, with full scale earth work under way in the fall.

Editor's note: Visit http://www.prairiestateenergycampus.com/ for a virtual tour of the plant, or to download a schematic of Prairie State's technologies, a plant rendering or images of recent sitework.

  Contact:
  Beth Sutton
  +1-505-287-2636

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SOURCE: Peabody Energy