The Portland Generating Station in Upper Mount Bethel Township, a coal-fired plant whose decades-old infrastructure and heavy pollution made it a target of environmentalists, will shut down in 2015.
In a statement released Wednesday, Houston power company GenOn Energy announced plans to close the plant and seven others between 2012 and 2015, saying new federal environmental laws will make them unprofitable.
The other affected plants are in Berks County, western Pennsylvania, Ohio and New Jersey. The Upper Mount Bethel facility will close in January 2015.
"It's not something that we'd like to do. We're not in the business to shut down power plants," said Steve Davies, a vice president at GenOn who oversees the Portland plant. "But you do what you have to do."
GenOn operates more than 40 power plants in 11 states. The closings will slash 13 percent of the company's generating power.
In Upper Mount Bethel, the power plant lauded for providing 70 jobs became better known in recent years for chart-topping emissions of sulfur dioxide and other airborne toxins, which have been linked to increased asthma rates in New Jersey. Some mornings, residents in nearby Knowlton, N.J., would wake up to find ash from an overnight burn-off coating their cars and homes.
In 2010, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection filed a petition with the federal Environmental Protection Agency to force the plant to reduce emissions, blaming GenOn for the Garden State's low air-quality scores.
The EPA upheld New Jersey's request, ordering the plant, which has minimal pollution controls, to cut pollution by 81 percent in three years.
But Davies said the federal ruling, which his company is appealing, is only a small part of the decision to shutter Portland. A "suite" of new federal rules has made small-scale coal power increasingly more expensive, he said.
Even if the EPA rule had fallen more in GenOn's favor, new mercury and air toxins standards that strictly limit mercury emissions nationwide would have done in the plant anyway.
"At the end of the day, it's really MATS that's driving this," Davies said, referring to the standards.
The regulation in question marks a shift from statewide limits in emissions, which allowed dirtier power producers to buy credits offsetting their pollution, to individual caps for facilities, which are harder to avoid. Some aspects also require installing pollution control technology, which Portland lacks.
If GenOn succeeds in its appeal involving New Jersey, it would push the plant's closing date back to April 2015, Davies said. Three natural gas turbines will continue to operate at the facility after the coal-burning generators shut down, but they'll only need about 10 staff members to operate. Layoffs won't begin until 2015, Davies said.
Environmentalists and some local residents met the news with jubilation, celebrating the end of a two-year fight to close the plant. At the peak of the protests last year, activists flew above the plant in a Greenpeace airship that read "IF YOU CAN READ THIS, YOU ARE BREATHING COAL POLLUTION."
"This is a victory for our lungs," Jeff Tittel, director of the Sierra Club of New Jersey, said in a statement. "Closing this dirty coal plant is a major step forward in improving New Jersey's air quality. This plant is the largest source of pollution in northwest New Jersey, and now the people of New Jersey will be able to breathe easier."
That was echoed by Myriam Fallon, a Greenpeace organizer working with the Multi-State Alliance to Promote Lasting Energy, a local group leading the fight against the plant. Her phone had been ringing with the news all morning, she said.
"They're all just incredibly happy to know that air quality as a whole will get better," she said.
New Jersey's joy was tempered by a vow to continue pressing GenOn to reduce the Portland plant's emissions 60 percent by January 2013 and at least 81 percent by 2015.
"Those steps are essential for the health and welfare of our residents," Bob Martin, commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, said in a statement.
But in Upper Mount Bethel and beyond, where the plant has survived for five decades as one of the area's oldest and largest employers, few thoughts were spared Wednesday for the environmental benefits.
Portland Mayor Lance Prator has seen neighbors land good jobs and retire on good pensions thanks to the plant. He said the borough has never had cause for complaint with GenOn. And Ron Angle, a former Northampton County councilman and longtime Slate Belt resident, fears for the hundreds of acres the facility will leave behind.
"It is a key piece of land for economic development for our area," Angle said. "I hate to see them close up. But I understand what the dilemma is. There's not a thing we can demand or ask of them. It's a corporate decision — they have to do what's best for GenOn shareholders."
The plant closures drew criticism from U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., who blamed an overzealous EPA for the loss of 315 jobs in Pennsylvania. He has signed two resolutions of disapproval asking the agency to scale back its plans.
"I am dismayed by the news that hundreds of Pennsylvanians will lose their jobs because of this impending wave of federal regulations," he said in a statement.
No one yet knows what will happen come closing day. Angle said he's talked to GenOn about reopening the station as a natural gas-fired power plant, which could save jobs and the company's tax dollars.
Converting the coal plant to run on gas, while currently too expensive, could be possible in the future, Davies said. As Marcellus Shale exploration expands, natural gas prices are set to hit record lows in the coming decade.
But the prospect of a reborn Portland Generating Station does little for activists.
"We definitely think that's the wrong decision, especially in a state like Pennsylvania that's having so much trouble from fracking," said Greenpeace's Fallon, referring to hydraulic fracturing, the process of freeing natural gas from shale. "This is a plant that doesn't need to be running for the electrical grid. It's solely there for GenOn's profits."
Besides the Portland plant, GenOn will close plants are in Elrama, Washington County; New Castle, Lawrence County; Shawville, Clearfield County; Birdsboro, Berks County; Niles, Ohio; Avon Lake, Ohio, and Glen Gardner, N.J.