The power plant sector consists of facilities that produce electricity by combusting fossil fuels and/or biomass (Subpart C). This sector includes power plants operated by electric utility companies and combustion units in the industrial, commercial, and institutional sector that generate electricity for their own use or to sell to other facilities or to an electric utility company. The emissions from this sector are solely from stationary fuel combustion sources such as boilers, simple and combined-cycle combustion turbines, engines, and incinerators. Approximately 42% of power plants measure emissions using continuous emissions monitoring equipment. The remaining facilities use engineering calculations based on measured data.

• Location and emissions range for each reporting facility in the power plant sector (as of 4/6/12).

  

  This map shows the locations of direct-emitting facilities. The size of a circle corresponds to the quantity of emissions reported by that facility.

Power Plant Sector 2010 Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reported to the GHGRP

• Number of facilities: 1,562
• Total emissions (CO2e): 2,326 million metric tons
• Emissions by category (CO2e):

   

  Combustion sources: Combustion emissions are produced from the combustion of fuel to provide process heat for industrial, commercial, or institutional use, whether the combustion is internal or external to the manufacturing process equipment. Examples are boilers, stationary internal combustion engines, process heaters, kilns, combustion turbines, and waste incinertors.

  Process emission sources: Process emissions are vented, evaporative, or fugitive emission from industrial manufacturing processes and from decomposition processes at landfills and wastewater treatment systems.

  • Combustion: 2,326 million metric tons
  • Process: Not applicable

CO2 emissions from the combustion of biomass are NOT included in emissions totals provided above.

Other EPA Resources

• U.S. Greenhouse Gas Inventory Report