Country United States Primary fuel Bituminous coal Owner Vectren | Status Operational Secondary fuel Natural gas | |
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Location Marrs Township, Posey County, near Mount Vernon, Indiana Commission date Unit 1 (coal): March, 1979
Unit 2 (coal): Feb, 1986
Unit 3 (gas): June, 1991
Unit 4 (gas): May, 2002 Address 8511 Welborn Rd, Evansville, IN 47712, USA | ||
The A. B. Brown Generating Station is a four-unit, 700-MW power generating facility, located on the northern bank of Ohio river, 8 miles east of Mount Vernon, Indiana and 5 miles southwest of Evansville, Indiana just west of the Posey-Vanderburgh County Line. Each of the two coal-fired units has a name-plate capacity of 265.2 MW. Bituminous coal is used as a primary fuel type, which can be substituted for natural gas. There are also two gas turbine units, 88.2 MWe of nameplate capacity each. The facility is owned by Vectren (formerly Southern Indiana Gas and Electric Company).
Contents
Emission control
In 1979, Unit 1 was constructed with a dual-alkali scrubber to help reduce sulphur dioxide emissions. In 1986, was completed and also uses a dual-alkali scrubber. From 2001 to 2005, Vectren installed four selective catalytic reduction (SCR) devices on all of the coal-fired units, which successfully cut nitrogen oxide emissions by 80 percent. In 2004, Vectren replaced an existing electrostatic precipitator at Unit 1 with a fabric filter. The investment increased the particulate matter removal efficiency to 99 percent at that unit.
Ash ponds
The A. B. Brown Station ash management impoundment was formed by building a dam to block off the outlet of a natural ravine about 0.5 miles (0.8 km) from the Ohio river. The ash pond consists of two dams. The Lower dam (built in 1978) has been classified by the Indiana DNR as a Significant Hazard (State ID#65-7, permit #D-4405, rev 1). The Upper dam (constructed in two phases in 2002 and 2007) was not classified, but has a permit #FW-21909. Liquid wastes being sluiced into the pond include fly ash, bottom ash, boiler slag, FGD belt filter wash down and water sump wastes, pyrites, material removed from the coal pile run-off pond, plant floor drain wash downs, boiler chemical leaning wastes, reverse osmosis system rejects, and rainfall/runoff from the surrounding area. According to Vectren, no discernible amount of material has been removed from the pond since it first began operation in 1978.