MORGANTOWN – Gov. Jim Justice announced Saturday that he is reactivating the West Virginia Public Energy Authority. The WVPEA was created by the Legislature with a mission to foster, encourage, and promote the mineral development industry in West Virginia – in particular coal-fired power plants.
Justice made the announcement at the West Virginia Coal Association’s 2021 annual conference.
“One thing we want to try to ensure is that West Virginia will continue to be an energy powerhouse for the entire world,” Justice said. “By reactivating the WVPEA, the state will maintain real-time, firsthand knowledge of the status of each power plant, their life cycle, and whether there are concerns of household power supplies being disrupted.”
The WVPEA will also help coordinate the output of merchant plants (such as Longview in Morgantown) with capacity needs of regulated plants (such as Longview’s neighbor, FirstEnergy’s Fort Martin). Additionally, the WVPEA will assist in developing the next generation of coal plants and long-term energy policies that use all of West Virginia’s resources, Justice said.
As part of the reactivation, the Governor has appointed all-new membership to the WVPEA:
- Jeff Allen, of Hurricane, a Republican. He is a senior vice president at Pardee Resources, a natural resources and energy management investment company.
- Charlie Burd, of Vienna, a Republican. He is executive director of the Gas & Oil Association of West Virginia.
- Chris Hamilton, of Elkview, a Republican. He is president of the West Virginia Coal Association.
- Jeff Herholdt, of Sissonville, a Democrat. He is a former director of the Division of Energy.
“In this country today, whether it be coal or gas, our energy industry has been under attack like you can’t imagine,” Justice said. “But at the same time, there is more and more demand for electricity globally. So we surely need to do everything in our power to protect our baseload generation capacity.”
TWEET David Beard @dbeardtdp EMAIL dbeard@dominionpost.com
