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WEC fall outages under way; plant upgrades aim to reduce disposal costs and improve reliability
Summary
Staff described fall outages at the Wayland Energy Center, including air-preheat coil work, generator brush replacement, cooling‑tower and pulverizer maintenance, and a new dry fly‑ash silo that staff said will allow marketing of fly ash as beneficial fill and could flip an expense into projected revenue.
Operations staff gave a detailed update on fall outage work under way at the Wayland Energy Center and related plant projects.
"We took the plant offline for an instrumentation repair and had to drop to minimum load on a couple of occasions, but staff returned units to full capacity within 24 hours," said Micah (Plant operations staff) while summarizing summer operations and fall outage work.
Micah outlined major projects: replacement of air‑preheat coils and generator brushes on Unit 1, continued replacement of elevated burners on WEC 2, cooling‑tower fill replacement (contractor supply issues noted), and an oxiler/boiler tie‑in with planned steam blows to clear piping before turbine exposure. He also described pulverizer preventive maintenance and timing: Unit 1 outage scheduled Nov. 7–Dec. 4, with WEC 2 outage running in the preceding window.
A major change is the new dry fly‑ash handling system and silo. Micah said switching from sluiced ash ponds to a dry system opens a market for fly ash as beneficial fill and shifts what was a disposal cost into outgoing material with potential revenue. Derek (Staff member) estimated that the change could produce a revenue flip of between about $500,000 and $800,000 annually, subject to market acceptance and regulatory compliance.
Staff also said a bottom‑ash bunker conveyor project is in reevaluation after higher than expected bids and longer lead times; some short‑term conveyor freeze issues last winter required interim plant engineering. Cooling tower fill delivery problems have introduced schedule risk for completing that element during the current outage.
No formal board action was taken; staff reported the outages and project status and said they will continue to manage contractor schedules and bring updates at future meetings.
