Bruce Mansfield coal-fired plant to close in 2021

FirstEnergy Solutions has set a date for the closure of the Bruce Mansfield coal-fired power plant in Shippingport — June 2021.

The bankrupt firm, a subsidiary of Akron-based FirstEnergy Corp., is shuttering all of its nuclear and fossil fuel plants in the next few years, including the Beaver Valley nuclear power plant about a mile away from Bruce Mansfield.

FirstEnergy says the plants can’t survive without government intervention to make them profitable.

As it has done before, the company issued a statement on Wednesday blaming a “market that fails to adequately compensate generators for the resiliency and fuel-security attributes that the plants provide.”

The wording is calibrated to FirstEnergy’s efforts to secure subsidies for these plants, which are out of money in large part because cheaper natural gas has generally supplanted coal as the dominant fuel for electricity generation.

FirstEnergy has lobbied the Trump administration and the Department of Energy to push grid operators such as PJM Interconnection, which manages the flow of electricity to 13 states including Pennsylvania, to tweak their rules so that they favor sources such as coal and nuclear.

“Depending on the timing of any federal policy action, deactivation decisions could be reversed or postponed,” the company said on Wednesday.

Bruce Mansfield, which employs about 300 workers, has a physical wound further exacerbating its financial situation — two of its three units have been down since a fire in January damaged critical equipment.