Evergy investing in natural gas powerplant in Nodaway County
(NODAWAY COUNTY, Mo.) Evergy has taken an interest in developing a 440 megawatt natural gas plant in Nodaway County.
This gas plant is the final plant announcement in a three-plant project with two others located in Kansas.
Evergy has requested an order from the Missouri Public Service Commission by Aug. 1 of this year to proceed for engineering and design for the power plant.
Jason Humphrey, vice president of development, expects the plant would open the community to more than 200 construction jobs.
“These are highly skilled, highly craft driven positions, folks who will work on cement, on welding, on the electrical design in construction of the plant and then post operation,” Humphrey said.
As Evergy looked for potential sites, Maryville stood out with good access to infrastructure, good access to natural gas and a willing landowner.
“It is several hundred million dollars of plant and property that will be built there, providing a tax base for the centrally assessed utility property taxes for all of Missouri,” Humphrey said.
Evergy will not only invest in construction jobs in the long term, but will provide a significant plant and property investment that will support the property tax base for the state of Missouri.
“Utility properties and taxes in the state of Missouri are centrally assessed, so they’re assessed by folks in Jefferson City and then apportioned out to the counties based on the miles of utility line that are in a particular county,” Humphrey said.
Essentially, Humphrey is saying the Evergy tax bill will follow those state rules when it comes to how the taxes would impact the community.
For Evergy, the technology they plan to invest in for this plant is Combined Cycle Technology which they have not invested in for 20 years.
“That is a gas turbine on the front end, and then the exhaust of that gas turbine we actually use in a boiler to make steam,” Humphrey said. “We can run that steam through a steam turbine.”
Evergy is letting the Missouri Public Service Commission work through the costs of the plant and will get a ruling later this year for a certificate of convenience and necessity case.
“Some of our plants are 40 to 60 years old, and it’s time to have a replacement base load power for those for the plan in Maryville, that’s what we call a peaking plant so it’s up and available for times of peak use on the grid,” Humphrey said.
Evergy hopes to have all three plants online and operational before 2030.
The Missouri Public Service Commission will be hosting a virtual public hearing at 12:00 p.m. central, Tuesday, April 1 via Webex to let the community learn more about the proposed power plant and answer questions.