Entergy Arkansas Implodes Remainder Of Retired Ritchie Plant At Helena

Entergy Arkansas Inc. safely brought down the last two components of the Robert E. Ritchie power plant through a controlled implosion at the Helena site, the utility announced on Thursday.

The implosion began the final stage of the demolition of what is left of the 51-year-old generating facility. Work crews began in June 2014 preparing the site for an implosion last Oct. 24, which brought down one of two remaining boilers. The second and larger boiler, along with a 450-foot emissions stack were safely brought to the ground Thursday.

The plant was retired from service in 2013 as part of a process to modernize the company’s generating portfolio to match ongoing and projected supply needs. Over the next several months, workers will clear the debris and finalize the demolition of the site.

“Going back more than 100 years, Arkansas has been on the frontier of modern electricity,” said Hugh McDonald, president and CEO of Entergy Arkansas, Inc. “We must continue to anticipate and plan for the electrical needs of our customers well into the future. This is just one of the many steps in modernizing our part of the electrical grid and, at the same time, making this space available for something productive.”

Built during the 1960’s, the Ritchie Plant housed three units that could produce 918 megawatts of electricity. To properly dismantle the facilities, Entergy has contracted with PRC Environmental, Inc. to handle the project. Plans are to remove all of the site’s above-ground structures, with the exception of the transmission switchyard.

The Ritchie units include:

· Unit 1, 356-megawatt gas/oil-fired unit, built in 1961, placed in inactive reserve in 2008. This is the unit that was imploded today.

· Unit 2, 544-megawatt gas/oil-fired unit, built in 1965, placed in inactive reserve in 2000. This is the unit that was imploded last October.

· Unit 3, 18-megawatt gas turbine, built in 1969, placed in inactive reserve in 2012.

Within the last eight years, Entergy Arkansas has acquired two modern, highly efficient natural-gas-burning power plants – one near Malvern and one near Monroe, Louisiana – and is in the process of acquiring a third near El Dorado. In addition, the company said in April it plans to enter into an agreement to buy all of the output from an 81-megawatt solar farm to be built near Stuttgart. Entergy Arkansas’ biggest power source, however, is nuclear, accounting for 71% of the company’s generation in 2014.

Click here to see a video of The Ritchie plant implosion.