Consumers Energy, Lima Township and Misinformation

Consumers Energy issued an update on July 1, giving a statement as to what the future holds for it in Lima Township.

In issuing a media statement on the issue with the update they provided to the community, Katie Carey, Director of Media Relations for CMS Energy & Consumers Energy said:

“Consumers Energy will not move forward with the proposed plant in Lima Township. We will release the option on the land back to the property owner and withdraw our application to study the costs of interconnecting this project to the electric grid with our grid operator. We recognize that our communication fell short to the Lima Township community to address their concerns about the project and apologize for that. Our Integrated Resource Plan, to be filed in the third quarter of this year, will show our blueprint to supply clean energy resources to meet the energy demand for our customers.”

With this, Carey said they also want to correct some misinformation they have been seeing and hearing:

• Data Center – the data center in Saline Township is a DTE Energy’s customer and not connected to the proposed natural gas plant in Lima Township. Consumers Energy builds and operates electric generation plants to serve our customers, not DTE’s. The potential plant in Lima Township had nothing to do with the data center. 
• Particulates – Since 2005, we have reduced particulate matter air emissions by over 90%, and natural gas is an important part of this transition, helping us replace higher-emitting fuels while maintaining reliability and affordability. For comparison, the emissions are less than what people experience during routine activities like driving in traffic, mowing their lawn or nearby farming operations. This approach, along with continued investment in cleaner generation sources, helps improve air quality across Michigan. 
• Brian Hartmann Home Sale – Brian Hartmann is not a Consumers Energy employee. He works for NorthStar Clean Energy Services, which is a separate company owned by CMS Energy. Given Brian’s position at NorthStar Clean Energy Services, there are regulatory firewalls in place for information to not be passed along between the two organizations. Brian had no knowledge of the land purchase or potential plant. We understand the concerns being raised, but any suggestion that we acted outside our ethical standards is simply not true.