FERC Blocks Cost-Recovery Bid for Propped-Up Centralia Coal Plant

Federal regulators have handed a setback to efforts to keep the retired Centralia coal plant in Washington State on financial life support. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission turned down a cost-recovery proposal from plant owner TransAlta that would have shifted the expense of running the facility onto electricity customers.

The dispute traces back to December 2025, when the Trump administration issued a 202(c) emergency order compelling Centralia to stay available even though it had been scheduled to shut down. That order was followed by three more, the latest arriving on September 11, 2026, which requires the plant to remain operational through the end of the year. According to the Sierra Club, Centralia has not actually been called on to generate a single megawatt since the first order landed — a striking detail given the sums involved.

The environmental organization, which has been challenging the emergency orders alongside its partners, argues that the Department of Energy has stretched its emergency authority beyond legal limits to override Washington’s long-planned shift away from coal. By FERC’s reckoning, the money TransAlta spent to comply with those orders should not be recovered from ratepayers.

That price tag is substantial. The Sierra Club puts the accumulated cost of keeping the aging plant available at more than $50 million, a figure it says has produced little in the way of actual electricity. Ben Avery, the Sierra Club’s Washington State director, welcomed the commission’s ruling, saying Northwest households should not be billed to keep an uneconomic coal facility on life support. He praised FERC for siding with ratepayers and said the group would keep pressing its case against what it describes as a reckless use of emergency powers.

The decision lands at the intersection of two broader trends: the push by some federal officials to extend the life of coal generation, and the determination of states and utilities to proceed with retirement schedules and clean energy replacements. For now, Centralia remains caught in the middle — ordered to stay ready, yet apparently not needed to run, with the question of who pays for that readiness now resting on firmer legal ground.