North Omaha Station (NOS) Update

There was a detectable drop in death rates in N Omaha after you converted3 units to gas.
While the NE Attorney General has sued OPPD for your planned conversion from coal As a Public utility you need to stay with your plan to convert your coal operations for the public good/ health of North Omaha and not be “ ok” with emissions at or slightly above the EPA suggestions . And do not allow Hilgers and Pillen to threaten you.
Covert those coal units- which have and do affect the health in NOmaha
Thank you

The EPRI study has systemic flaws. It does not include the particulate production of the power plant. Considering that this is the main inhalation pathway, and North Omaha has an unusually elevated asthma incidence, this is a glaring omission. Another omission is a failure to test the EPRI model with actual measurements of the pollutants it does predict. An atmospheric model that doesn't have even a minimal test of its accuracy under local conditions is not to be trusted. These local conditions may not be accurately modeled in part because of the limited domain space used to define the local topography. Figure 3-4 of the report is a map of far-field receptors used in the study. These do not extend beyond 60th street, and omit the higher hills in the area. Since the hills confine the dispersion plume under inversion conditions, the terrain model is lacking important terrain data that may cause it to underestimate pollution concentrations.

There is also a lack of air monitoring in the area. While it is helpful to have sulfur dioxide readings near the plant boundary, there are no similar readings for PM2.5 or nitrogen oxides. The sulfur dioxide readings are not always available, either. For example, the northeast Omaha sampling site showed high levels of sulfur dioxide overnight on Dec. 9-10, 2025. This was during a strong wind event, where the stack plume seems to have been dispersed near the ground, since there were no similar readings reported at the Douglas County Health Department Campus site. However, there were no updates available online the entire weekend, including a strong inversion event on the morning of Dec. 14 that would be expected to confine the stack plume to the river valley south of the plant.

The EPRI report does not provide adequate assurance to the residents of North Omaha that the environmental risk of the coal plant operation should be acceptable. The residents have been promised the closure of those plants. OPPD should keep its promise.

Please make the transition. Stop burning coal and hurting children. Oppd needs to use the tools available to it to get the job done. So far we see a management that values tech billionaires’ fortunes over our health.

A commitment has already been made to move away from coal and convert this station. I urge those considering this decision to stick with that original commitment. While I can appreciate the progress that has been made in reducing emissions, we should be looking forward, and be making sure we are set up best for the future. And I don't mean just the next decade. We should be thinking about the next several generations after us. While continuing to use this station in its current state indefinitely might be a simpler solution now, it likely makes things harder or more complicated down the line. I understand that power demand is increasing, however keeping this station running with coal cannot be the only solution, especially if some of the power demand is currently or will be due to large commercial operations for things like data centers, as it seems likely with conversations planned with large industrial consumers if this resolution passes. If industrial entities need a large source of power, they should be the ones to foot the bill of ensuring the infrastructure can support them, as well as paying enough to ensure rates do not go up for everyone else because of the significant demand increases.

There are thousands of people that live in fairly close proximity to this power station and their health has likely already been affected to some extent due to the usage of coal. OPPD should value it's customers' health as a number one priority. Just because all measures are below EPA risk thresholds does not mean the risk is non-existent.

I appreciate how OPPD management and staff are concerned and committed to providing reliable, affordable and environmentally sensitive energy services to their customer/owners. I understand that energy demands are changing rapidly. However, I do not understand why management has not been following the Board’s directives, going back to when the North Omaha Station was originally slated to be refueled from coal to natural gas and has already been granted an extension to 2026. Additionally, there haven’t been any other solutions presented, at least publicly, to keeping the NOS coal plants open indefinitely for reliability. These plants are already over 50 years old and seem to be well past their economically feasible lifespan. Also, the North Omaha coal plants have been subject to the river freezing and consequently been unable to supply power. This doesn’t seem very reliable. I also wonder why the Board has been presented with this one proposal to keep NOS burning coal without management completing an Integrated Resource Plan first in order to inform this decision. Experts have analyzed the November Committee meeting presentation and OPPD data and suggest that (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11dZMKJU4Yk) there are many alternatives that would make up for the megawatts provided by burning coal at NOS. There is mention that back in 2017 there was a goal of 300MW from increasing demand response resources. As of 2024, there was only 140MW achieved. Moreover, apparently there are only 22 commercial and 2 industrial customers participating in Demand Response. There seems to be a lot of upside for this as well. Distributed energy resources like rooftop solar with battery storage that could be incentivized and aggregated for a virtual power plant all could replace the megawatts of coal burning in North Omaha-all without harming the public health and incurring massive costs to keep these outdated plants running. Closing North Omaha coal plants has been a long time directive by the Board and management is failing to achieve this directive. At this point, I request that the Board reject this upcoming resolution, explore and implement other feasible alternatives and have the North Omaha coal plant follow the directive SD-7 as passed by the Board. Thank you.

Close the plants. Stop making sweetheart deels with AI companies that drove much of our energy demand. By keeping NOS open you're poisoning our communities. These are your voters and more importantly are human beings with no other option for power. Being below EPA levels doesn't make something safe and I know that you're smart enough to know that. By continuing to keep the plant open you are personally choosing to hurt your neighbors and I hope that this fact burdens you for the rest of your life if you vote yes. You would be morally culpable for this. Don't be a coward. Stand up for your neighbors.

Submitted by Leigh Neary, PE, Omaha resident and owner of Exist Green

My name is Leigh Neary. I am an Omaha resident and a small business owner. I am also a California-licensed Professional Engineer and worked for more than ten years as an environmental engineer, including work involving industrial systems, emissions, and regulatory compliance.

I am asking the board to honor the commitment that was made to transition the North Omaha Station and to stop extending timelines that have already been delayed multiple times. Continued deferral is not a neutral action. At this point, delay functions as a decision, one that keeps an aging facility operating under standards and assumptions that no longer reflect what we now know and what is reasonably achievable in modern power generation and pollution control.

Affordability matters, and keeping electricity affordable for Omaha households is important. This does not require choosing between cleaner power and higher residential rates. As a public power utility, OPPD’s first obligation is to the people and communities it serves, not to accommodating outside corporate growth in ways that shift costs or impacts onto residents. If new large loads are driving the need for additional generation or infrastructure, those loads should pay the true costs they create through appropriate rate design and contracts. Residential customers should not be asked to subsidize growth or continued pollution. I say this as a business owner who has invested in on-site solar for my own operation and who believes businesses have a responsibility to account for their energy use and to plan growth in a way that works with, rather than against, a responsible grid.

OPPD has stated that impacts associated with extending North Omaha Station fall below established EPA risk thresholds. Regulatory limits and risk thresholds are minimum legal benchmarks, not safety guarantees. No amount of mercury exposure is considered harmless, and sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides are well-established contributors to respiratory and cardiovascular harm. Meeting a numerical threshold means a pollutant is legally permitted, not that it is without risk.

Much of our regulatory framework evaluates pollutants individually, often under controlled conditions. Real-world exposure does not occur one pollutant at a time or in isolation. In reality, exposure is cumulative and continuous. People are exposed to multiple pollutants, from agriculture, consumer products, and air emissions, over long periods of time. These combined exposures add up, which is why extending emissions over additional years, even at legally permitted levels, still meaningfully contributes to overall risk.

Our understanding of these impacts has advanced significantly, which is why a coal plant built today would be designed around far more efficient pollution controls and stricter expectations than those in place decades ago. Continuing to operate older units and delaying transition decisions does not reflect what we now know or the responsibility that comes with operating critical infrastructure.

I respectfully urge the board to:
- Honor the commitment to transition the North Omaha Station.
- Stop extending timelines that the public has already waited years to see fulfilled.
- Protect residential affordability by ensuring large new loads pay the full costs they create.
- Recognize that meeting minimum regulatory requirements does not mean risk has been meaningfully reduced.

Public power carries a heightened obligation to act with care, foresight, and accountability. This decision is an opportunity to demonstrate that responsibility.

I know OPPD Management and Staff and the Board of Directors are committed to providing affordable, reliable and environmentally sensitive energy services to our customers. And I understand the challenges facing OPPD and the Board in the current period of growing energy demand, while at the same time integrating renewable energy and new generation sources.
In September 17, 2024, revised language to SD-7 was proposed that included the following:
"By year end 2027, achieve an approximate 3,500,000 ton annual reduction in CO2e emissions at the North Omaha Station (NOS) site relative to OPPD’s 2013 benchmark of 3,960,179 tons at the station." This goal was set assuming the coal units at the NOS would be converted to natural gas. Iif OPPD maintains the operation of the coal units, this goal will not be met. In 2024, the CO2 emissions from the NOS was 1,275,409 short tons (tons).
I support converting the North Omaha Station coal units to natural gas, now.
Jonathan Paetz
District 8 Resident

We need to move away from dirty coal. A promise was made and it should be kept. Real people are impacted by the continued operation of this plant. Raise rates for heavy users if you must.

At the November 18, 2025, OPPD Board of Directors All Committee Meeting, OPPD Management and Staff provided information to the Board, that recommends continuing the operation of the North Omaha Station (NOS) for an undefined period of time.
Reasons for continuing the operation of the NOS included:
Increased residential connections
Low voltage events in North Omaha and potential for rolling backouts.
Southwest Power Pool (SPP) increasing the winter Planning Reserve Margin (PRM) to 38% in 2029 (+933 MW).
At the same meeting, OPPD indicated, if the Board approves the continued operation of NOS, that OPPD will have conversations, the next day, with new industrial customers regarding 2000+ MW power use.
I am having a hard time squaring the concern that OPPD Management and Staff have regarding the justification to keep North Omaha operating, to maintain the reliability of the OPPD system and meet the increasing SPP PRM requirement, while at the same time, working toward adding a potential 2000 MW of new power users to the system.
Maybe OPPD should keep their commitment to the North Omaha Community and complete the refuel/retirement of the NOS first and then bring on new industrial customers.
Jonathan Paetz
District 8 resident

I'm glad they're keeping it the same. The grids around us are already at maximum.

Your health study found risks were below current EPA thresholds. Those numbers change over time. EPA adjusts and rarely increases thresholds, but does lower them with new data. Science shows that there is no true safe level of any neurotoxin that is in coal. All levels harm the human body. No human created EPA political infused level is truly safe; unless it is zero. Please do not use this as a shield to justify continuing to use coal. At a minimum, a compromise would be to convert one of the two remaining coal plants in 2026. We do need to prioritize health of our community and people. Thank you!

There are several errors in the Commitment to Communities section on this webpage. Your commitment is first and foremost to provide enough energy at a reasonable price. While health is important (I also want clean air), there are other steps OPPD can take, and have taken, to provide a clean source of electricity. I have spoken with several employees and the NOS is not the problem some want us to believe. As you state, there is no evidence of bad health outcomes from this plant. It has also been proven that the imaginary CO2 concern is not a real concern. To believe otherwise is a denial of facts and history. I have seen and studied the charts which are supposed to say it is. It's not. Please keep the plant open and operating or OPPS may find itself facing more lawsuits, but from customers instead of the State. Which will drive up costs more because of the legal expenses.

Thank you

Has OPPD considered CBAs (Community Benefit Agreements) or Rate Reductions for customers that are most impacted by the extension of the Coal Plant? It seems to me that this most impacts residents in the immediate area of the facility (Health costs/Home Valuations) and they should receive the most benefits from having the facility extended.

Removed by moderator.

Dear OPPD

The conversion plan should be upheld and data centers should be paying their fair share instead of the average customers.

I personally can name multiple individuals with neurological diseases: six from St. Philip Neri, my church community, one relative that worked at the North Omaha Power Plant and and four neighbors all breast cancer survivors.

Please do the right thing and transition to gas NOT this last minute bait and switch.

Do the moral, ethical and right thing.

Dorothy Polan


Thank you for your thoughtful consideration.

Dorothy Polan

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