Environmental groups react to approval of Canadys gas plant

SC Public Service Commission gives green light to Santee Cooper and Dominion

CHARLESTON, S.C. — Today, the South Carolina Public Service Commission voted 7-0 to approve Santee Cooper and Dominion Energy South Carolina’s 2,200-megawatt joint gas plant in Canadys, South Carolina on the banks of the Edisto River. For years, environmental and clean energy groups have raised concerns about the project’s potential negative impact on nearby communities, the ACE Basin, and other natural resources.

The Southern Environmental Law Center, on behalf of the Coastal Conservation League and the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, intervened in the proceeding to raise concerns about the environmental impacts and rising costs of the massive plant and the 71-mile greenfield pipeline needed to service it.

In response to the gas plant’s approval, the groups released the following statements:

“This massive, polluting plant has already doubled in cost from $2.5 to $5 billion in the last year, and the utilities admitted at the hearing that its final costs would likely be even higher,” said Kate Mixson, SELC Senior Attorney. “We’re certainly worried that the plant and pipeline will negatively impact communities and raise customers’ bills. We will closely monitor the project’s next steps to ensure its impacts are as mitigated as possible.”

“We are deeply concerned about the environmental, public health, and economic impacts of this plant and the associated pipeline, and we are also alarmed by the utilities’ repeated delays in retiring the coal units this plant was supposed to replace,” said Taylor Allred, State Energy & Climate Program Director at the Coastal Conservation League. “It would be a deep injustice to allow the utilities to raise rates for families and small businesses to fund tens of millions of dollars needed to keep their aging coal units online, on top of the billions spent on this massive gas plant, to serve potential future energy demand from big data centers.”

“When you count the all-in cost to customers to build, finance, and operate this gas infrastructure, our predictions two years ago that this project would cost as much as the failed $9 billion VC Summer nuclear project are coming true,” said Eddy Moore, SACE Decarbonization Director. “The difference is that the environmental damage from millions of tons per year of new air pollution for fifty years plus using the gas pipeline to industrialize the ACE Basin will be worse. Meanwhile, in the 5 or more years before this project delivers any power, the world economy will continue to shift towards the cleaner, more advanced energy solutions that South Carolina should embrace.”