NRG Energy opens first new power plant in a decade
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TH Warton plant in northwest Houston. Photo: Shafaq Patel/Axios
A new natural gas plant in the Houston area is coming online for the Texas grid in time to meet the sweltering summer's power demand, NRG announced this week.
Why it matters: The TH Wharton peaker plant can come online in about 30 minutes when demand spikes and when ERCOT requests additional electricity during periods of grid stress — including extreme weather and hurricanes.
The big picture: It's one of the first projects completed under the Texas Energy Fund, a state-backed financing program created to encourage the construction of new dispatchable power generation after the deadly 2021 winter storm.
- It's also the first new-build power plant NRG has brought into operation in more than a decade.
Zoom in: NRG expects the facility to operate only one to two hours on a typical day.
- NRG Wholesale president Matt Pistner said the units are especially valuable during summer evening "Netflix hours," when families are home, air conditioners are running and electricity demand is elevated.
What they're saying: "These are shock absorbers for the ERCOT grid," Pistner told reporters during a tour last month. "These are kind of quick start, address the handshake between wind and solar."
By the numbers: The plant can provide 456 megawatts of power when needed, enough to power more than 100,000 Texas homes during peak hours.
Between the lines: The facility uses emissions-control technology designed to limit pollutants such as nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide and to meet state standards, Pistner said.
Follow the money: While the company declined to disclose the cost of the Wharton project, Pistner said rising equipment and labor costs have made new power plants more expensive to build.
- "If you were to do this again today, yes, the escalation in price of both equipment and labor has gone up significantly," he said, noting NRG locked in key equipment pricing before costs climbed.
What we're watching: While it's unclear how much new demand data centers will place on the grid, Pistner said, facilities like the TH Wharton peaker plant will continue serving as backup resources.
Zoom out: Another NRG peaker plant under development, the Greens Bayou facility, will be able to come online in about 10 minutes.
- Collectively, the company's planned projects are expected to add more than 1.5 gigawatts of new natural gas generation capacity in Texas by 2028.