Utah: Green Energy Hub of the West

Utah

Green Energy Hub of the West

Millard County is home to what could become the West’s new energy hub, thanks to a reconfiguration of the state’s largest coal-fired power plant.

By 2025, the Intermountain Generation Station in Millard will be decommissioned as a coalfueled power plant. New natural gas-fueled generating units will come online with green hydrogen as part of the fuel mix. Initially, 30% of the overall energy output will come from green hydrogen, expanding to 100% by 2045 as technology evolves.

“Many coal communities around the country are struggling with the closure of power plants,” said John Ward, spokesman for the Intermountain Power Agency, the owner of the entire project, known as the Intermountain Power Project (IPP). “IPA, and the other project participants, have diligently worked to develop new energy projects that can build on the substantial infrastructure already in place at IPP, including land, regional transmission systems, rail, highway, and a highly-skilled energy workforce.”

Green hydrogen is made using machines called electrolyzers, which have been around for centuries. During a process known as electrolysis, water is broken into hydrogen and oxygen. The oxygen is released into the atmosphere, and the hydrogen is captured. As long as the electricity to power the machines comes from a renewable source such as wind or solar, the process results in zero greenhouse gases, unlike other forms of hydrogen production that release carbon dioxide into the air.

Hydrogen is widely used in refining and chemical manufacturing and is playing a growing role in transportation. Now, the proliferation of solar and wind energy are making green hydrogen viable. At times, energy from these sources exceeds the demand for them, making them financially attractive options to power electrolysis. More and more hydrogen power applications are created each year, from buses to airplanes to forklifts, further increasing demand.

As part of the Millard plant’s reconfiguration, Mitsubishi Power Americas will install turbine generators to create electricity from natural gas and hydrogen. However, not all the hydrogen generated will be used immediately, so it will need to be stored until it’s ready for use.

A potential storage solution is a geological structure known as salt domes. Huge underground caverns created through solution mining provide an economical way of storing hydrogen for use even months later.

Coincidentally, the largest and only commercial salt dome in the western United States is underneath the Millard generation station. Magnum Development owns the salt dome. Mitsubishi partnered with them to create an advanced clean energy storage project that will produce and store large quantities of green hydrogen immediately adjacent to IPP. The facility has the potential to be one of the largest renewable energy storage reservoirs in the world.

“This is a unique and important opportunity for Utah,” said Laura Nelson, executive director of the Green Hydrogen Coalition and co-organizer of the Western Green Hydrogen Initiative. “The state will be engaged in building the energy hub of the West while providing more jobs to rural communities, all while generating clean energy.”

With the reconfiguration of the generation station, the potential use of the unique salt dome structure, and the development of clean energy storage, Utah is poised to help other states and cities achieve the reality of clean energy. For example, Eric Garcetti, mayor of Los Angeles, announced in 2018 that L.A. has committed to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power will use power from the IPP to help achieve that goal.