Home Jobs Employment Media Contacts Tours Video Gallery Photo Gallery Event Registration Calendar Generation Portfolio Buy power for resale
Energy Insider on power plants
Officials at Antelope Valley want to stay one step ahead of the game in regards to new technology to produce electricity.
Basin Electric Power Cooperative - April 23, 2010
Originally broadcast by KFYR TV
Reported by Jacob Kaucher
Watch the video at this link: Energy Insider on power plants
With chimneys firing, the Antelope Valley Electric plant near Beulah is one of the backbones of power production in North Dakota. This base load plant is designed to pump out power non-stop.
“The bottom line is people use electricity 24/7. You have to produce electricity 24/7,” says Daryl Hill, Basin Electric Power Cooperative spokesman.
The belly of this beast is the boiler, designed to be large and in charge because it burns lower-quality lignite coal. The heat is used to make steam that drives turbines and electricity-producing generators. Antelope Valley's generators pump out 900 megawatts, enough to power 720,000 homes. And it's just one of eight plants in the state.
“North Dakota is a net exporter of power because with all the plants here, there isn't enough demand for that electricity,” Hill says.
The reality though is that burning 350 tons of coal per hour comes with a cost - tons of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere each year. Motivated in part by the success of carbon capturing next door at the gasification plant, Antelope Valley is looking at ways to sequester its CO2 output. An engineering and design study will be completed by the end of this year.
“That will give you a road map to say, 'Where do we go with this? How do we do this? How do we use that CO2?' A lot of questions could be answered in that FEED study,” Hill says.
Because with carbon regulations possibly on the way and new technology to produce electricity, officials at Antelope Valley want to stay one step ahead of the game.
Headquarters
1717 East Interstate Avenue
Bismarck, ND 58503-0564 USA
Phone: 701.223.0441
