PAGE – U.S. Rep. Tom O’Halleran, D-Ariz., was joined by Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez on a site visit to Navajo Generating Station last week.

They were welcomed to NGS by SRP Major Project Director Gary Barras; Joe Frazier, SRP’s director of generation engineering and former plant manager; NGS Decommissioning Manager Lemuel Brown; TetraTech Senior Consultant Nathan Betts and Gretchen Kitchel, executive principal for SRP Strategic Planning & Economic Development.

After a safety briefing and presentation on the demolition progress to date, O’Halleran and Nez donned hardhats and safety vests and were escorted by vehicle around the plant site to view the changed landscape of NGS.

Throughout the areas where the 220-foot and 775-foot stacks once stood alongside the NGS electrostatic precipitators and 245- foot boilers lay dozens of enormous piles of twisted and chopped up metal that once was the power plant.

“It looks like a scene from ‘Star Wars,’” Nez said, looking at huge absorber vessels laying on their sides.

O’Halleran was in Page to discuss his legislation titled the National Energy Workforce and Providing Recovery Opportunities to Manage the Industry’s Shifting Economics (NEW PROMISE) Act. It would provide millions of dollars of economic development funding to communities that were affected by the closure of a coal fired power plant or coal mine, like Page, the Navajo Nation and the Hopi Tribe.

“NGS was a powerhouse for northern Arizona and the many rural and tribal families who relied on the good-paying jobs it provided,” O’Halleran said. “With the continued challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, tourism has plummeted, especially from the international visitors the Page community was so used to welcoming.”

The congressman, Nez and Hopi Chairman Timothy Nuvangyaoma first met with Page Mayor Bill Diak and the Page Chamber of Commerce. O’Halleran said his legislation takes into account concerns of tribal leadership as well as county, local and statewide stakeholders to provide an all-of-the-above recovery approach for Page and communities like it across rural America.

If passed, the NEW PROMISE Act would allocate:

$50 million annually to distressed communities for economic development planning over 14 years, totaling $700 million

$50 million annually for infrastructure investments in distressed communities over five years, totaling $250 million

$100 million in displaced-worker training support over 10 years

$250 million in support for lost revenues to impacted communities, which phases down annually over seven years for a total of $1.35 billion in support to coal communities as a whole

The congressman wanted to know how long it took to clear debris once the explosive demolitions took place, how much of the plant would be recycled, how much of the turbine block remained, and how many workers and contractors the decommissioning project required.

Betts said workers are still cleaning up but that 80% of the stacks’ debris – is gone. Removing and recycling scrap metals from the boiler and precipitator blasts will take months.

“For a structure that tall, you’re talking well over a month for each [stack],” he said. “There’s a lot of rebar, and you will see a lot of it piled up out there.”

Brown reported that there were about 150 workers on-site, including 111 contractor personnel, 30 SRP Site Services employees, and the rest drivers and EMTs. About a third of those are Navajos from the local area, he said.

O’Halleran was also interested in how much of NGS would be recycled.

“Ninety-plus percent of everything that’s here will be recycled,” Frazier said.

An average of 21 trucks per day leave the plant site loaded with steel and copper to be recycled, Barras added, and the concrete from the stacks will be crushed up and used as backfill material.

“We actually have a scale set up and have a two-shift operation going on,” he said. “Some of it’s going to Utah to a furnace up there. Some is going to Colorado. It’s a huge recycling project.”

Most of the hazardous waste materials have been removed, and testing is ongoing to ensure hazards are not left behind when decommissioning ends.

APS continues to operate the 500 kV yard that is still part of the grid. The warehouse and the railroad right-of-way have been surrendered to the Navajo Nation. In the future, the 230 kV yard, along with the warehouse, maintenance building, administration building and railroad maintenance facilities, will also be surrendered to the Nation.