By David Beard
The Dominion Post
MORGANTOWN (TNS) — FirstEnergy sisters Mon Power and Potomac Edison on Monday filed notice with the Public Service Commission that they will be filing an application for a certificate of public convenience and necessity for their planned new combined cycle gas plant.
The notice is only three sentences long and points out that the application will include related rate recovery.
FirstEnergy made its official announcement of its plan during an event held on Nov. 6 at Harrison Power Station. The company said Mon Power and Potomac Edison will be moving forward with their plan for a 1, 200 megawatt natural gas combined cycle power plant to go online in 2031.
Monday’s notice expires after 90 days. At the November event, the companies said they will file their plan to build the plant — at a site to be determined — with the PSC for its approval during the first quarter of 2026.
The companies are looking at two possible paths to build the plant. One is partnering with another company to build the plant and transfer it to FirstEnergy. The other is to build it themselves.
According to WVU’s Bureau of Business and Economic Research, the construction phase would generate 3, 200 direct and indirect jobs and $68 million in state and local tax revenue. Ongoing operations would generate 2, 200 job and $86 million in annual tax revenue.
While both coal-fired plants — Harrison and Fort Martin — are nearing retirement age, FirstEnergy said in November that they plan to keep both operating through 2035, evaluating them in five-year increments.
A combined cycle unit uses both gas and steam combustion turbines to generate electricity. In the gas combustion turbine, air is pressurized using a compressor, injected with fuel and ignited to generate high-temperature pressurized gas that expands to drive the turbine and generate electricity. The waste heat from the gas turbine is then used to generate steam to drive a steam combustion turbine for additional electricity generation.
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