November 3, 2021: Yesterday, the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) reached a landmark decision to protect ratepayers from more than $215 million that Arizona Public Service (APS) wasted on the Four Corners coal plant instead of investing in lower cost clean energy. Four Corners is the largest remaining coal plant in the West and is not slated to retire until 2031.
Specifically, the Commission disallowed roughly 45% of APS’s request to recover its costs for “selective catalytic reduction” pollution controls at its Four Corners coal-burning power plant. Despite evidence in APS’s own modeling indicating that continuing to operate Four Corners was a losing bet for ratepayers, the utility sunk hundreds of millions into this aging, dirty, and expensive coal plant. The Commission’s decision also requires APS to take a serious look at the future of the Four Corners plant. Analysis from Sierra Club and other parties showed that accelerating the retirement of the coal plant from 2031 to 2023 could save APS ratepayers upwards of $1 billion.
The path to this victory began with years of advocacy by the Beyond Coal Campaign, the Grand Canyon Chapter, and volunteers and allies. Law Program attorneys Louisa Eberle and Rose Monahan represented Sierra Club in the APS rate case, which has been pending since late 2019.
See the full press release here.