(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – In this file photo from June 10, 2021, a flume of emissions flow from a stack at the Cheswick Generating Station, a coal-fired power plant, in Springdale, Pa. Pennsylvania cannot enforce a regulation to make power plant owners pay for their planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions, a state court ruled Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2023, dealing another setback to the centerpiece of former Gov. Tom Wolf’s plan to fight global warming. (AP Photo/Keith Srakocic, File)

Reported by Danielle Smith of Keystone News Service

(Harrisburg, PA) Two major coal-fired power plants in Pennsylvania that were set to close in 2028 will now stay open through 2032 under a proposed agreement with state regulators. The consent decree requires the Keystone and Conemaugh plants to upgrade their wastewater treatment systems and meet stricter federal standards. Thomas Shuster with the Sierra Club says the decision from Governor Josh Shapiro reflects a surge in energy demand from data centers that could drive up costs statewide. The Shapiro administration says the Keystone and Conemaugh Generating Stations each generate about 17-hundred megawatts of electricity, enough to supply power to hundreds of thousands of homes.