Micron Chip Plant Impact Update

A recent report by the Syracuse Post Standard described the most recent environmental impact assessment for the Micron Technology’s planned semiconductor plant.  Last month I described the keynote address for the Business Council of New York 2023 Renewable Energy Conference Energy by Richard Ellenbogen.   I contacted Ellenbogen to let him know that the original projection of for energy use that would be the same as the state of Vermont has been expanded to the same as Vermont and New Hampshire.  This post describes Ellenbogen’s reaction to that news.

Ellenbogen is President [BIO] of Allied Converters and frequently copies me on emails that address various issues associated with New York’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA).  I have published other articles by Ellenbogen because he truly cares about the environment and the environmental performance record of his business shows that he is walking the walk.   When he sent a copy of the presentation I asked if I could it post after the conference.

Why NY State Must Rethink Its Energy Plan

Ellenbogen’s keynote address was titled “Why NY State Must Rethink Its Energy Plan and Ten Suggestions to Help Fix the Problems.”  My post on the presentation  summarized the power point presentation for his keynote address.

One of his suggestions concerned the Micron plant:

Allow Micron Technologies to build a combined cycle plant the size of Cricket Valley Energy Center on their property. The Micron facility will use more energy than the state of Vermont. With generation on-site, the thermal energy could be used at the plant and the 350 GWh of annual line loss will be eliminated. Instead of making them look “green” on paper by buying carbon credits, let them be green in reality with high efficiency generation and have lower energy costs to make them more competitive and able to recoup the $5 billion rebate without faking it. That will eliminate the increase in statewide energy use related to the facility.

Micron Environmental Impact

Glen Coin and Tim Knauss provided an update (subscribers only unfortunately) on the environmental impacts of the facility.  Their article included the following statements:

The new estimates of water and energy use are for entire the complex when finished 20 years from now. The company plans to build the four fabrication plants, or fabs, sequentially: Construction of fab 1 starting in November 2024, and work on the fourth fab completed by 2043.

When the Clay complex is complete in 2043, it would use more water and more electricity than all of the company’s factories and offices in use today. The Clay complex will consume 16 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year; according to the 2023 sustainability report, all of the company’s fabs now use a combined 11 billion kilowatt hours

Sixteen billion kilowatt-hours per year is enough for more than 2 million average households.

The Micron fab would use about the same amount of electricity as Vermont and New Hampshire combined, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Ellenbogen Update

Ellenbogen prepared the following update after I sent him the article:

I have been using the Micron facility as an example of how the CLCPA is actually going to increase NY State’s carbon footprint because transmitting all of that energy to the Micron site, as much as is used by the state of Vermont,  over long distances was going to result in an amount of lost energy on the wires that could operate 1-3/4 Cornell Universities.  One of my readers sent me an update of energy use because now it is projected that the Clay complex will consume 16 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, as much as Vermont and New Hampshire combined, or 16,000 Gigawatt Hours annually (16 Tera-watt hours).  That is double the original projections and the idea that this could be supported with renewable generation is laughable.  16,000 GWh is an 11%  increase in NY State electric usage just related to the one facility.  The line loss will also double to consume the output of about  a 100 megawatt fossil fuel plant under continuous operation.

To put the Micron facility’s usage into perspective, in its last full year of operation the 2 Gigawatt Indian Point nuclear plant generated 16.3 Tera-watt hours so the Micron facility will need to be supported by a 2 Gigawatt fossil fuel or nuclear plant on site or  2.1 Gigawatts of generation off site, 5% more.  NY State’s policy makes absolutely no sense.  To run the Micron facility would require using about 4 GW of the projected 9 GW of offshore wind to support the plant or 16 GW of solar arrays covering 128,000 acres (80 acres per 10 MW)  or 200 Square miles.  NY State has 7 million acres of farmland so solar arrays to support the Micron facility  would use almost 2% of the farmland in the state and would also require an enormous amount of battery storage, the cost of which would greatly exceed the cost of a nuclear plant on site.  A combined cycle generating plant on site would be about 75% less than the cost of the nuclear plant.  Both the combined cycle gas plant and the nuclear plant on-site offer the option of recovering the waste heat and using it in the plant to make Micron even more energy efficient.  With regard to the solar and wind, NY State is having major difficulties getting all of their renewable projects finished because of cost issues and interconnection issues, let alone adding this gigantic lead weight to the Camel’s back.

The politicians can say whatever they want about the wonders of the CLCPA but the mathematical analysis of the project says that the CLCPA and the mandate for Micron to buy Carbon credits is going to raise NY State’s carbon footprint substantially while also raising Micron’s costs.  It’s a Lose-Lose proposition for everyone.

That’s what happens when you outsource utility planning to Climate Scientists and environmental activists that have no understanding of what they are doing, which is what NY State has done.

Conclusion

I agree with Ellenbogen’s points.  The obvious approach for the energy needed by Micron would be co-generation.  As much as I would like to say that this should be provided by nuclear, I agree with him that costs and implementation time preclude that option now so a combined cycle natural gas-fired plant is the pragmatic choice.  Either option produces waste heat that can be used at the facility which increases the energy efficiency.  As he says the expectation that renewables can provide the necessary power on top of the existing load needs is laughable.  Importantly, a facility like this must have uninterruptible power and providing that from wind and solar is an extreme challenge. Finally, I want to close with one of Ellenbogen’s points from his presentation: “When fantasies meet reality, reality always wins.”  The Climate Act renewable plans are fantasy and the inevitable clash with reality is going to be interesting to watch.