Evergy Must Close its Hawthorn Coal Plant by 2025

Kansas City, MO – Community leaders gathered today in the Indian Mound Neighborhood and called on Evergy’s CEO, David Campbell, to close its Hawthorn coal-burning power plant by 2025. Hawthorn is one of the last coal plants that operates within a major city in the United States and was the backdrop for the press conference. 

“My neighbors in Indian Mound, the Historic Northeast and all across Kansas City, deserve clean air, soil, and water, now and for generations to come.” said Brynne Musser, member of the Indian Mound Neighborhood Association. “I’m asking Evergy to begin the decommissioning process for Hawthorn now. I will keep asking. We will keep asking. We will keep fighting for our families and our future. Now is the time for Evergy to help ensure my community breathes easier.” 

More than 35,000 people, including more than 10,000 children, live within a three-mile radius of the Hawthorn coal plant. More than 40 percent of the population within three miles of the coal plant are Black and Latino, compared to the state average of 18 percent. 

“We will not put a date on people's lives. We want this coal plant closed immediately and not turned into a natural gas plant or any other kind of dirty energy plant,” said Jayla Atkinson, Environmental Justice Educator with CleanAirNow. “Fossil fuels are giving us cancer and diseases that we have to pay for financially and physically while companies like Evergy face no consequences. Please remember no decisions can be made about us without us, especially when our health is being compromised for the profit of big companies like Evergy.”

Annually, the Hawthorn plant releases more than 2,900,000 tons of carbon dioxide pollution, 1,200 tons of sulfur dioxide pollution, and 900 tons of nitrogen dioxide pollution into the air.  The Climate Protection and Resiliency Plan, authorized by the City of Kansas City, Missouri, includes a preferred retirement date for this coal plant by 2025.  

“Evergy is located in an area that has massive wind and solar resources, and while it’s made progress on wind energy, there’s more room for growth and new investments in solar, which it critically lacks,” said Bridget Sanderson, member of the KCMO Climate Protection Steering Committee. “The science is clear. We must decarbonize faster than Evergy’s plan in order to avert the worst impacts of heatwaves, droughts, and floods.” 

Last month, Sierra Club released an update to its Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges report, which saw Evergy move from an F to a D grade. The report looks at future plans, not past actions, to determine a utility’s grade. Evergy’s grade improved because it plans to stop burning coal at its Lawrence power plant in Kansas, but remains low because the utility’s plan to burn coal at three coal plants, totaling five units, until 2039. Evergy does not have a public retirement date for its Hawthorn or Iatan II coal plants. 

“We’re not against Evergy. We’re for Evergy being a leader in moving from fossil fuels to clean energy,” said Billy Davies, Organizer with the Missouri Chapter of the Sierra Club. “More extreme weather means running our utilities more, which is a climate impact felt in our wallets. This is especially true in lower income communities where people are threatened by evictions if utility services are disconnected as families choose between paying for food, medicine, rent, transportation, and utility bills. We need Evergy to help electrify everything in a way that doesn’t rely on making the climate crisis that we are already experiencing even worse.”