Electric generating plantEIA plant no. 1726

Conners Creek

Type
Natural Gas Steam Turbine
Status
Retired March 2013
Nameplate (when running)
275 MW
Units
4
In service since
1951–1971
Operator
DTE Electric Company
Location
Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan

Conners Creek is retired. EIA's monthly generator inventory (EIA-860M, August 2026) lists every generator at this natural gas plant as retired; the last one retired in March 2013. It is not counted among Michigan's operating plants or in any ranking on this site.

The figures below describe the plant when it ran: equipment from EIA Form 860 (2024).

The 275 MW is nameplate capacity: the most this plant's generators are rated to produce, not what it actually generates. EPA eGRID reports no positive net generation for it this year.

How it works

A steam plant burning natural gas

natural gas insteamwater returns1boiler burns natural gas2steam spins turbine3generator4cooling condenses steam
  1. A boiler burns natural gas to turn water into high-pressure steam.
  2. The steam pushes through a turbine, spinning it thousands of times a minute.
  3. The turbine's shaft turns a generator, which sends power to the grid.
  4. Spent steam is cooled back into water — by a cooling tower, a lake or a river — and pumped back to the boiler.

Why the numbers look like this: a boiler and turbine this size take hours to bring up from cold, so steam plants were built to run steadily for long stretches. A steam plant with a low capacity factor is usually being held in reserve, or run only through the hottest and coldest weeks.

This plant highlighted in navy-ringed pin; other generators within 25 miles shown as fuel-colored dots.

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Location

Address200 Lycaste Ave
CityDetroit
CountyWayne County
StateMichigan
ZIP48214
Coordinates42.35920, -82.95970
OperatorDTE Electric Company

Generators (4)

IDTechnologyFuelNameplate capacityStatusOnline
15Natural Gas Steam TurbineNatural Gas135 MWRetired1951
16Natural Gas Steam TurbineNatural Gas135 MWRetired1951
1Petroleum LiquidsDistillate Oil2.7 MWRetired1971
2Petroleum LiquidsDistillate Oil2.7 MWRetired1971

Grid context

NERC RegionRFC
Balancing AuthorityMidcontinent Independent Transmission System Operator, Inc..

About Natural Gas plants

Natural gas plants are the workhorse of the modern grid. Combined-cycle units achieve very high efficiency and can ramp up and down quickly to balance variable renewables. They emit roughly half the CO₂ per MWh of coal and far less of other pollutants, but they still release upstream methane during fuel extraction.

Other plants in Wayne County

View all plants in Wayne County →

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