Good News! The PA DEP heard our calls for a public hearing, and one has been scheduled – for the Tenaska Westmoreland Generating Station’s long overdue operating air permit.
This public hearing announcement comes after months of advocacy by local community members who have serious concerns about the facility and potential impacts to their health. According to their own Plan Approval Permit and the proposed Title V draft, the 940-megawatt gas-fired power plant located in South Huntingdon Township is and will continue to release a variety of air pollutants known to be harmful to human health., such as Particulate Matter (PM), Carbon Monoxide (CO), Hazardous Air Pollutants (HAPs), Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), and more. This hearing represents the first opportunity for those who live and work near the facility to advocate for a stricter, more protective Title V Operating Permit.
Here are the public hearing details:
Wednesday, February 4, 2026, 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm
The Huntingdon Place, 90 Supervisors Dr., West Newton, PA 15089
Pre-registration to testify is required by calling: 412-442-4311 and registering with Laina Aquiline at least one week in advance of the hearing.
Comment Guidelines
Oral testimony will be limited to three to five minutes. (NOTE: One minute = 150 words). A written copy of your comments must be submitted at the hearing.
Your written comments should include your name, address, email address, and phone number, and you should include the following information:
Citizen Public Hearing, Comments on Draft Title V Operating Permit No. 65-00990 (Draft TVOP) for Tenaska Pennsylvania Partners LLC’s Tenaska Westmoreland Generating Station, located at 446 Smithton Pike, Smithton, PA 15479, South Huntingdon Township, Westmoreland County.
Even if you do not wish to speak at the hearing, please plan to attend and show solidarity with the folks who will be testifying. We’d love to have a large turnout for this important and long-awaited public hearing.
If you cannot make it to the hearing, you may submit written comments up to 10 days after the public hearing. Email your comments to the following email addresses with the subject line: “Citizen Public Hearing Comments on Draft Title V Operating Permit No. 65-00990 (Draft TVOP) for Tenaska Pennsylvania Partners LLC’s Tenaska Westmoreland Generating Station.”
- Thomas Joseph: tjoseph@pa.gov
- Eric Gustafson: egustafson@pa.gov
What can you comment on?
You should use this opportunity to talk about your personal experiences living next to this facility. Additionally, engineers and attorneys from the Environmental Integrity Project reviewed the proposed Title V Operating Permit and identified the following major concerns:
1. The Draft Permit Does Not Include Monitoring Provisions Sufficient to Determine Compliance with Emissions Limits, which is Required by the Clean Air Act.
a. The Draft Permit is deficient because it does not include monitoring requirements that are sufficient to ensure compliance with the limits in the permit. The Clean Air Act requires that a Title V Operating Permit must include in the permit itself monitoring requirements that are specific and frequent enough to show if the facility is complying with or violating the limits in the permit, but this permit fails to include this required monitoring.
b. The Draft Permit sets limits on emissions of seven pollutants (VOCs, total PM, PM10, PM2.5, sulfuric acid mist (H2SO4), sulfur oxides, or greenhouse gases) from the two combustion turbines (see p.37) but does not include sufficient monitoring requirements to assure compliance with the limits.
c. The Draft Permit must require additional monitoring and maintenance to ensure compliance with NOx, VOC, and CO emission limits.
2. The Permit Fails to Limit the Duration of Combustion Tuning, Which Could Lead to High Emissions Releases.
a. The Draft Permit’s section restricting operating hours for “Startups, shutdowns, and combustion tuning” for the combustion turbines (page 39) are actually only limiting durations of startups and shutdowns but not combustion tuning. The permit must be changed to limit duration for combustion tuning as well.
3. Tenaska Must Be Required to Report to DEP All Emissions Monitoring it Does to Determine Compliance with Permit Limits.
a. The Draft Permit does not require recordkeeping or reporting of all emissions data, and all monitoring that Tenaska does to determine compliance with permit limits for each source should be required to be reported to DEP. Otherwise, DEP and the public cannot readily access that information.
4. The Draft Permit Impermissibly Fails to Include a Schedule for Coming into Compliance with the Clean Air Act.
a. The Tenaska Westmoreland facility has been in non-compliance with the Clean Air Act for all 12 of the last 12 quarters, but the Draft Permit fails to include a schedule for when and how they will comply.
5. This is a new facility with a new permit, and the limits and monitoring should be the best possible to reflect the state-of-the-art controls expected of a new facility.
If you’d like additional assistance or have questions, feel free to contact:
Lisa Graves Marcucci, Environmental Integrity Project: lgmarcucci@environmentalintegrity.org
Em Hough, Mountain Watershed Association: em@mtwatershed.com, 724-455-4200 x 10
For additional background information, visit MWA’s landing page for the Tenaska Westmoreland Generating Station.