Just three months after admitting that its push into green energy wasn’t producing returns for shareholders, NRG Energy CEO David Crane announced his resignation. Chief Operating Officer Mauricio Gutierrez will assume the role.
Under Crane’s helm, NRG launched a billion-dollar push into rooftop solar, wind energy and car charging stations. But the company in September announced plans to return to its core conventional generation business. NRG stock has plummeted 60% so far this year.
Crane took over as CEO in 2003, when it was a regional power producer in bankruptcy. It became one of the nation’s largest owners and operators of solar facilities.
More: Wall Street Journal
NRG Shedding Plants to Fix Balance Sheet
NRG Energy said it is selling two power plants for $138 million to reduce debt and improve cash flow.
In one of his last official announcements before resigning, NRG CEO David Crane said the plant sales are part of a “reset” process. “By streamlining our fleet, we can create additional value for our shareholders and meet the needs of our customers with reliable, efficient and economic power,” he said.
NRG is selling its 535-MW, waste coal-fired Seward plant in Pennsylvania to Robindale Energy Services and its 352-MW, natural gas-fired plant in Shelby County, Ill., to The Woodlands-based Rockland Capital. NRG said the two plants would need about $17 million in maintenance in the next three years.
More: Fuelfix
Century-old Iowa Plant to Go Offline in 2017
Alliant has said it will close its Dubuque Generating Station on Iowa’s eastern border in June 2017. The Mississippi River plant, which used coal as a fuel source before being converted to gas four years ago, only ran occasionally and was not necessary to maintain system reliability.
Alliant this year settled EPA allegations of Clean Air Act violations, agreeing to close the plant in 2019 or face fines. The facility’s 13 employees will be offered positions at other plants.
Alliant has no plans to sell the property, where a power plant has been in operation for more than a century. If it does, the city of Dubuque has first rights to buy it.
More: Telegraph Herald
Google Surpasses 2 GW in Clean Energy PPAs
Google announced it has signed six deals on three continents to buy 842 MW of clean energy, bringing its worldwide renewable power purchases to more than 2 GW. Google said it now supplies 37% of its power needs with renewable energy, and the company eventually wants to power all 14 of its data centers with green energy.
“We’re going to get renewable energy any way we can, no matter what it takes,” said Michael Terrell, who leads energy policy and market strategy for Google’s global infrastructure team. The new purchase of solar and wind energy is enough, as Wired pointed out, to power two cities the size of San Francisco.
Duke Energy was involved in several deals with the search giant: One in North Carolina for 61 MW of solar from a project in Rutherford County; and two others in Oklahoma for 401 MW of power.
More: The Washington Post; Wired; The Oklahoman
FirstEnergy Names Farley Vice President of Sales
FirstEnergy named Brian A. Farley vice president of sales, where he will be responsible for strategic planning and day-to-day operations. The division includes the governmental aggregation, large commercial and industrial, and residential and municipal channels.
Farley, who joined FirstEnergy in 1989, most recently was director of wholesale and provider-of-last-resort transactions.
He holds a bachelor’s in electrical engineering from Cleveland State University and a master’s in business administration from Baldwin Wallace University.
More: FirstEnergy
10 Former Burleson Lawyers Open Pittsburgh Office
The law firm of Frost Brown Todd is opening a Pittsburgh office with the addition of 10 attorneys formerly with law firm Burleson. The attorneys will join the firm’s energy industry practice.
The office is the firm’s 12th and expands its presence to eight states. Kevin Colosimo is the member-in-charge of the new office.
More: Frost Brown Todd
Judge OKs Breaking Up Former TXU into 2 Companies
Energy Future Holdings won bankruptcy court approval last week to shed about $30 billion in debt and split into two separate companies.
The bifurcated EFH can exit bankruptcy in a few months, provided that Texas regulators bless the reorganization and the company wins an Internal Revenue Service endorsement of the tax structure behind the deal. Luminant, the company’s unregulated generating business, will go to senior lenders, who are owed about $24 billion. Oncor, the regulated transmission unit, will go to a coalition of lower-ranking creditors and Hunt Consolidated, a Dallas-based energy and real estate company.
With lower debt, the two companies should be in a better position to weather the difficult market conditions that caused the $48 billion leveraged buyout to flounder about seven years after it was completed under the leadership of KKR and TPG Capital. The new plan wipes out the buyout sponsors’ equity.
More: Fort Worth Star-Telegram
EFH Agrees to $2M Settlement over New Mexico Uranium Mines
Energy Future Holdings has agreed to pay $2 million to help EPA clean up closed uranium mines it owns in northwest New Mexico.
The agreement, filed Dec. 1, settles a dispute with the Justice Department, which objected to the company’s bankruptcy plans, claiming EFH was trying to skirt its environmental responsibilities. According to court papers filed by the government, EPA found uranium contamination was still present decades later after a now shuttered subsidiary extracted uranium from four New Mexico mines in the 1970s and 80s.
The agency estimated the cost of the cleanup at $23 million.
More: The Dallas Morning News
Luminant Acquiring 2 Gas Plants for $1.6B from NextEra Energy
Luminant, the power generation subsidiary of Energy Future Holdings, is buying two Texas gas-fired power plants for $1.6 billion from NextEra Energy Resources. The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2016.
Luminant said its purchase of the 1,912-MW Forney Energy Center and the 1,076-MW Lamar Energy Center in Paris have been approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware, which is overseeing the reorganization of EFH.
More: Houston Chronicle
Southern Co. Buys 51% Interest in Texas’ Largest Solar Farm
Southern Co. is buying the controlling interest in a 157-MW planned Texas solar farm, its first solar investment in the Lone Star State.
The Atlanta energy giant said it bought a 51% stake for an undisclosed sum in the planned Roserock solar facility in West Texas near Fort Stockton. Canadian Solar Inc., which is developing the project, will retain 49% ownership through its Recurrent Energy subsidiary.
The Roserock solar farm will provide power to the city of Austin and surrounding areas through a 20-year power purchase agreement with municipally owned Austin Energy. Roserock is one of the largest solar facilities planned in Texas.
More: Fuelfix
El Paso Customers Oppose Proposed $71.5M Rate Increase
About 20 people gave El Paso Electric’s proposed $71.5 million rate increase a thumbs down at an El Paso City Council hearing Dec. 2. The utility is seeking a 10.15% rate of return.
Most of those speaking at the hearing were solar advocates. They included homeowners with solar rooftop systems who said their rates would increase more than other residential customers, and solar system installers who said the utility’s proposed new rate class for residential solar customers would discourage consumers from embracing renewable energy.
Representatives of Western Refining’s El Paso refinery, the utility’s largest customer, said the proposed increase has prompted the company to begin exploring the possibility of generating its own electricity.
More: El Paso Times
Aksamit Announces $725M Investment, 3 Neb. Wind Farms
Aksamit Resource Management announced plans to build three wind farms generating 449 MW in southeastern Nebraska, representing a $725 million investment.
The developer said it has filed with SPP for permission to hook up two of the wind farms to transmission lines owned by the Nebraska Public Power District. The projects include a 150-turbine farm spread over 30,000 acres with a capacity of 300 MW and a 76-MW project with 40 turbines on 8,000 acres.
Aksamit said a third project, a 40-turbine farm in Saline County that can produce 73 MW, will be up and running within the next two years.
More: Lincoln Journal Star