February 22, 2024 - US electric-generating retirements are expected to drop 62% year on year in 2024, marking the lowest amount of capacity retirements in 16 years, the US Energy Information Administration said Feb. 20. 

Operators plan to retire 5.2 GW in 2024, compared to 13.5% GW in 2023, with coal-fired and natural gas-fired generation accounting for a combined 91% of planned capacity retirements this year.

The decrease in retirements is no surprise as the EIA has been showing a drop in retirements for 2024 for some time, said Morris Greenberg, senior manager with the low-carbon electricity team at S&P Global Commodity Insights.

"Several independent system operators are seeing a significant drop in retirements this year," Greenberg said. "Some of this is just coincidence. However, some may reflect stronger demand forecasts and reliability concerns."
 

A rebound to over 15 GW of retirements is expected in 2025, including 10 GW coal from coal, Greenberg said about EIA data. The S&P Global forecast for 2025 retirements is similar to the EIA's, while S&P Global's projections for 2024 retirements are not as low as the EIA data.

Meanwhile, EIA data shows 51 GW of permitted capacity with a nominal 2024 online date, but not all of this will be completed this year, Greenberg said, adding S&P Global projections are lower at about 45 GW of capacity additions this year.

Natural Gas Closures

Natural gas is expected to have the most retirements in 2024.

"The 2.4 GW of scheduled retirements of natural gas capacity represent 46% of expected US capacity retirements in 2024 and 0.5% of currently operating US natural gas-fired capacity," the EIA said.

The biggest gas retirements is slated to be Constellation's 1,413.6-MW Mystic Generating Station in Massachusetts, making up 60% of gas capacity retirements in 2024, according to the EIA. The Mystic Generating Station has been in operation since the 1940s.

"The other five petroleum- and natural gas-fired units at Mystic have already retired, so with these last unit retirements the entire plant is scheduled to shut down when its cost of service agreement expires in May," the EIA said.

The 16 turbines at the Tennessee Valley Authority's 754-MW Johnsonville station are also expected to retire this year.

Looking ahead, gas retirements are expected to increase with 2.94 GW slated to be retired in 2025, according to the EIA.

 

Coal Capacity Closures 

"After 22.3 GW of US coal-fired electric generating capacity retired over the past two years, coal retirements will slow down in 2024," the EIA said. "The 2.3 GW of coal-fired capacity scheduled to retire accounts for 1.3% of the US coal fleet that was in operation as of the end of 2023."

Coal retirements will come primarily from older units, according to the EIA.

"The capacity-weighted average age of these retiring units is almost 54 years, about 10 years older than the weighted average age of operating coal units," the EIA said. "US coal units are retiring as the nation's coal fleet ages and as coal-fired generators face competition from natural gas and, increasingly, renewables."

The largest coal retirements in 2024 will be the 626-MW Seminole Electric Cooperative Unit 1 in Florida and the 626.1-MW Homer City Generating Station Unit 1 in Pennsylvania. The other two coal-fired units at the Homer City Generating Station retired last year.

Looking ahead, coal retirements are scheduled to increase in 2025 with 10.9 GW expected to be retired, according to the EIA.

Petroleum Closures 

Almost all of the more than 450 MW of US petroleum-fired capacity scheduled to retire this year will be from the TVA's Allen power plant. Petroleum accounts for 9% of all 2024 planned retirements.

"The plant is shutting down its combustion turbine site consisting of 20 old combustion turbine units totaling 427 MW," the EIA said. "These units supplied power during times of peak demand across the TVA power system."

 

Allen was primarily a coal-fired plant before TVA retired all coal-fired units in 2018, replacing the capacity with the Allen Combined Cycle Natural Gas Plant, which went into operation in May 2018.