Members of the Centralia City Council received a grand tour of the TransAlta plant northeast of Centralia Thursday to get a behind-the-scenes look at the plant’s operations and pending transition to a “100% clean electricity future.”
Five years after the retirement of Unit 1 of the Centralia facility, TransAlta will close Unit 2 at the end of 2025. Sixty-four employees were laid off when Unit 1 was retired in 2020.
It’s all part of a longstanding agreement with the state to halt its coal-burning operations. In April of 2011, then-governor Chris Gregoire, TransAlta executives and members of the environmental and labor communities signed legislation to transition the state off of combustible coal power.
The city councilors, minus Mayor Kelly Smith Johnston, discovered how TransAlta produces and distributes power to Centralia residents, as well as the coal plant, which opened in 1971.
In 2011, TransAlta created a $55 million fund to invest in energy efficiency, economic and community development, and education and retraining initiatives in Washington. This followed the state Legislature requiring TransAlta to shut down its two 670-megawatt coal-fired electric plants.
Now, the company is in the final stages of shifting away from coal.
Councilors left the tour impressed with not only the facilities but TransAlta’s commitment to clean energy.
“We got to see what an asset this place has been to our community for years. We got to see everything that’s gone into making this place run for as long as it has, and just seeing the depth and breadth of everything has been pretty mind-blowing to me,” Deputy Mayor Chris Brewer said. “You get to see the care taken to reclaim nature to what it is and what it previously was in this area.”
TransAlta’s limited purpose landfill will close Dec. 31, 2025, and the power generating company is working on enforcing its closure plan, dated December 2015. According to the plan, the landfill will be closed in a manner that will control, minimize or eliminate post-closure infiltration of liquids into the waste and releases of leachate or contaminated runoff to the ground, surface waters or to the atmosphere.
The preliminary closure construction schedule includes site preparation and mobilization, waste contouring and intermediate cover placement, installation of permanent drainage structures, and seeding and planting of vegetation, as applicable.
Councilor Norm Chapman called the plant an “engineering masterpiece” and said he was left speechless by the ingenuity and inner workings of the facilities.
However, he expressed his concerns with the transition to clean electricity.
“Like anybody else, I have concerns because the electricity you have in the wall has got to come from somewhere. If we transition to more electric stuff, it’s got to come from somewhere,” he said. “I don’t want to have the California-style brownouts. I hope they can come up with something down the road. As a consumer of electricity, it’s not free. We’ve got to make it affordable and clean for residents. I hope they can sit down at the table, whoever the powerhouses are, to figure it out so we can continue to live our peaceful existence here.”
