Caithness Long Island Energy Center's 350 MW combined-cycle generating facility is the first major baseload power plant built on Long Island in over thirty years. Because of the significant advances that have been made in power plant technology, it is the cleanest, most efficient, most water conserving, and most reliable baseload powerplant on Long Island.

KEY ENVIRONMENTAL CHARACTERISTICS

The plant incorporates advanced gas turbine combustion technology and air emission control systems which greatly reduce air emissions as compared to the older baseload plants on Long Island.

Combined-cycle generation systems recycle heat that would otherwise have been lost up the stack and instead use it to generate more power, making the process very efficient in the use of fuel. As a result, fuel consumption is reduced by about one-third, fuel costs are substantially lower, and air emissions and the production of greenhouse gases are greatly reduced.

The cleanest plant on Long Island, the CLIEC produces 94 percent fewer pollutant emissions and 36 percent less greenhouse gas emissions compared to older baseload generating units on Long Island. The benefit to the environment is that 10 million tons less greenhouse gas will enter the atmosphere over the expected life of the plant. Ongoing, minute-by-minute monitoring, using state-of-the-art control systems, ensures that Caithness conforms to all rigorous emissions standards set by the EPA and New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

The CLIEC is also the first plant on Long Island to employ a closed-cycle, air-cooled condenser in its steam cycle. As a consequence, the plant will use 95 percent less water than other plants on Long Island that employ evaporative cooling systems, saving the extraction of water from Long Island’s aquifers by billions of gallons each year.

BUFFERED FROM RESIDENTIAL AREAS

The project is centrally-located within an industrial area in the Town of Brookhaven . The site is surrounded by industrial properties in every direction. There are less than half a dozen residences within a three-quarter mile radius of the project site, far less than for any other baseload power project on Long Island.