(The following article by Dustin Bleizeffer was posted on the Casper Star-Tribune website on March 8.)
GILLETTE, Wyo. — BNSF Railway said Tuesday that it will commit coal train delivery resources to a Wyoming power plant that has found itself dangerously short of coal supply despite its location near the nation’s most prolific coal mining field.
“BNSF is aware of the situation involving the Laramie River Station and has committed a train set of its own equipment to supplement Basin Electric’s three coal train sets in service to the Laramie River Station,” BNSF Railway said in a prepared statement on Tuesday.
Basin Electric Power Cooperative announced Monday that it may be forced to curtail electrical generation at the 1,650-megawatt power plant near Wheatland by 20 percent or more because it was not getting enough coal delivery out of the Powder River Basin. Customers served by the Laramie River Station could see higher utility bills if the plant is forced to buy power on the spot market, where higher natural gas and coal prices translate into higher bills. It was uncertain Tuesday whether the railroad’s planned response would avert that outcome.
Electrical customers who could be affected include primarily rural residents throughout northeast Wyoming and in Big Horn, Carbon, Fremont, Hot Springs, Johnson, Natrona, Park and Washakie counties, along with people living in Cody, Wheatland, Guernsey, Pine Bluffs, Powell, Lusk, Lingle, Fort Laramie, Gillette, Basin, Torrington and Deaver.
Last spring a pair of derailments on a triple-track line in eastern Wyoming severely cut the flow of coal from Wyoming’s Powder River Basin — the nation’s most prolific mining region at more than 400 million tons of coal per year.
Laramie River Station requires 24,000 tons of coal per day to operate at full capacity, but found itself with only six days of coal supply on Monday — a dangerously low stockpile considering winter weather could still trigger high electrical demand.
Owners of the power plant said it had not been receiving adequate shipments of Powder River Basin coal, although federal regulations require rail shippers to supply an amount of fuel supply to support full generation.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Surface Transportation Board said it had not been notified by any party that there was a delivery problem at Laramie River Station. The federal agency does have powers to enforce delivery requirements, but it was unclear on Tuesday whether the agency could intervene in this situation.