İsken Sugözü power station is a 1320 MW operational coal fired power station in Turkey.

History

The plant started operating in 2003.

Ownership

STEAG has 51% share and

OYAK Ordu Yardımlaşma Kurumu (OYAK) (English language, English: ''Military Solidarity Institution''), is a Turkish Charity (practice), charity and Turkish Armed Forces, military pension fund with around 470,000 members. The OYAK Holding Investment S ...

49%. As of 2025 Steag is trying to sell its share.

Coal supply

Electricity generation

Health and Environmental Impact

Local pollution

There is a lot of

heavy industry Heavy industry is an industry that involves one or more characteristics such as large and heavy products; large and heavy equipment and facilities (such as heavy equipment, large machine tools, huge buildings and large-scale infrastructure); o ...

around Iskenderun Bay, including two other

coal-fired power station A coal-fired power station or coal power plant is a thermal power station which burns coal to generate electricity. Worldwide there are about 2,500 coal-fired power stations, on average capable of generating a gigawatt each. They generate ...

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and Emba Hunutlu. Cancers increased in the decade since the plant started and respiratory diseases increased during the 2010s, but because smokestack measurements are only sent to the government not published, it is difficult to estimate how much of the air pollution illnesses and deaths are due to the power plants. However İsken Sugözü is the oldest and the only one using subcritical technology, so is likely to be more polluting per GWh electricity generated than the other two coal-fired power stations (a study for China estimated 200 to 400 early deaths per GW-year). Mercury emissions have been estimated at over 200 kg/year. It is estimated that closing the plant by 2030, instead of when its licence ends in 2039, would prevent over 3000 premature deaths. As well as the plant discharging into the bay, a ship carrying coal ash was wrecked there.

Greenhouse gases

As Turkey has no

carbon emission trading Carbon emission trading (also called carbon market, emission trading scheme (ETS) or cap and trade) is a type of emissions trading scheme designed for carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHGs). A form of carbon pricing, its purpose ...

it would not be economically viable to capture and store the gas.

Climate TRACE Climate TRACE (Tracking Real-Time Atmospheric Carbon Emissions) is an independent group which monitors and publishes greenhouse gas emissions. It launched in 2021 before COP26, and improves monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) of both ...

estimates it emitted over 6 million tons of the country's total 730 million tons of greenhouse gas in 2022: the company is on the Urgewald Global Coal Exit List.

Opposition

There were protests by Greenpeace and others. Opposition to the power plant carried forward to opposition to

Emba Hunutlu power station Emba Hunutlu power station is a 1320 MW coal fired power station in Turkey in Adana Province. it is the largest Chinese foreign direct investment in the country. Despite opposition from many environmental organisations the plant was started u ...

in the late 2010s.

References

Sources

External links

İsken Sugözü power station
on Global Energy Monitor {{Power stations in Turkey Coal-fired power stations in Turkey Buildings and structures in Adana Environmental protests in Turkey