The Morgantown Generating Station is a 1,477 MW electric generating

Electricity generation

Electricity generation is the process of generating electric energy from other forms of energy.The fundamental principles of electricity generation were discovered during the 1820s and early 1830s by the British scientist Michael Faraday...

 plant owned by GenOn (formerly Mirant

Mirant

Mirant Corporation, an Atlanta-based energy company, produces and sells electricity in the United States. The company was spun off from its former parent, Southern Company, on April 2, 2001...

), located in the unincorporated town of Newburg, Maryland

Newburg, Maryland

Newburg is an unincorporated community in Charles County, Maryland, United States. Newburg has two stores, a lodge hall, a fire department, as well as the Piccowaxen Middle School and Dr. Thomas L. Higdon Elementary, both serving the entire Cobb Neck peninsula ....

, near Morgantown

Morgantown, Maryland

Morgantown is an unincorporated community in Charles County, Maryland. It lies south of the Governor Harry W. Nice Memorial Bridge on the Potomac River at Lower Cedar Point. It is known for the Mirant Morgantown Generating Station smokestacks. In 2007, a controversial coal barge loading facility...

, on the Potomac River

Potomac River

The Potomac River flows into the Chesapeake Bay, located along the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. The river is approximately long, with a drainage area of about 14,700 square miles...

. The station was built in 1970.

Plant description

The facility consists of two base loaded

Base load power plant

Baseload is the minimum amount of power that a utility or distribution company must make available to its customers, or the amount of power required to meet minimum demands based on reasonable expectations of customer requirements...

 624 MW coal-fired steam generating units, four 65 MW oil-fired peaking

Peaking power plant

Peaking power plants, also known as peaker plants, and occasionally just "peakers," are power plants that generally run only when there is a high demand, known as peak demand, for electricity.-Peak hours:...

 combustion units, and two 18 MW black start

Black start

A black start is the process of restoring a power station to operation without relying on the external electric power transmission network.Normally, the electric power used within the plant is provided from the station's own generators...

 peaking turbines. The two coal-fired units are base-loaded supercritical steam units which went into operation in 1970 and 1971. The four peaking units are General Electric

General Electric

General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...

 Frame 7 units which went into operation in 1973, while the two black start peaking units are General Electric Frame 5 units which went into operation in 1970 and 1971.

Coal

Coal

Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...

 is delivered to the Morgantown generating station by CSX Transportation

CSX Transportation

CSX Transportation operates a Class I railroad in the United States known as the CSX Railroad. It is the main subsidiary of the CSX Corporation. The company is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, and owns approximately 21,000 route miles...

 train using the Pope's Creek Subdivision

Popes Creek Subdivision

The Pope's Creek Subdivision is a CSX Transportation railroad line in Maryland, running from Bowie to Morgantown and the Chalk Point Generating Station.- History :...

 rail line. Construction of a coal barge unloading pier on the Potomac River began in 2007.

History

All of the generating plants at the Morgantown Generating Station were built by the Potomac Electric Power Company

Potomac Electric Power Company

The Potomac Electric Power Company, known as Pepco, is a public utility supplying electric power to the city of Washington, D.C., and to surrounding communities in Maryland...

, which sold them to the Southern Company

Southern Company

Southern Company is a public utility holding company of primarily electric utilities in the southern United States. It is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia with executive offices also located in Birmingham, Alabama. The company is currently the 16th largest utility company in the world and the...

 in December 2000 as a result of the restructuring of the electricity generating industry in Maryland

Maryland Electric Deregulation

Maryland Electric Deregulation is the result of a bill passed in 1999 by the Maryland General Assembly. This bill changed the entire face of the Maryland utility industry.The past several years have seen a flurry of changes in the energy industry in Maryland...

. The station was included in the Mirant spin-off in April 2001. Mirant was merged into GenOn Energy in 2010.

Operations

The Morgantown Generating Station is dispatched by the PJM Interconnection

PJM Interconnection

PJM Interconnection LLC is a Regional Transmission Organization which is part of the Eastern Interconnection grid operating an electric transmission system serving all or parts of Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee,...

 regional transmission organization

Regional Transmission Organization

A regional transmission organization in the United States is an organization that is responsible for moving electricity over large interstate areas. Like a transmission system operator , an RTO coordinates, controls and monitors an electricity transmission grid that is larger with much higher...

.