New York power

Produced 31.1 gigawatt-hours of electricity in 2024 — enough electricity for about 3,100 homes for a year.*

Air quality & health in Nassau County

Nassau County has a population of 1,381,715. Across five conditions the American Lung Association tracks — childhood asthma, adult asthma, COPD, lung cancer, and cardiovascular disease — it reports a combined 287,550 cases in the county.

Federal monitoring recorded 1 days of good air quality and 0 moderate days in the county over the most recent year, with 0 days rated unhealthy for sensitive groups.

Long-term exposure to air pollution has been linked to certain health conditions, particularly for children and older adults. Where electricity comes from affects how much combustion pollution is produced on the grid.

These figures describe the county as a whole and are not specific to this facility. Sources: American Lung Association – State of the Air (New York); U.S. EPA Air Quality Index.

The story behind this New York power plant

Of New York’s 100 natural gas plants, Plant No 2 Freeport sits at #60 by the electricity it produced in 2024. It is owned by the Village of Freeport and has been operating since 1973 at 289 Buffalo Ave, with two generators on site.

Its generators are combustion turbines, which burn fuel to spin a turbine much like a jet engine drives a plane. In 2024 it produced 31.1 gigawatt-hours (a gigawatt-hour is a billion watt-hours, a way of counting electricity over time), or about 3,100 homes’ worth of yearly use. Its capacity is 78.6 MW (a megawatt is a million watts, the most it can deliver at once).

Generation profile

The plant can produce 79 megawatts of electricity at once, across 2 generating units. In 2024 it produced 31.1 gigawatt-hours in total, which works out to about 5% of what it could have produced running flat out all year — the pattern of a plant that runs only during periods of high demand.

Nearby places worth exploring

Freeport sits on Long Island’s South Shore in Nassau County. Jones Beach State Park and the city of Long Beach are close by on the Atlantic shore. Old Westbury Gardens and Hofstra University are also in the county.

Local school district

Freeport Union Free School District

Common questions

* Homes-powered and emissions comparisons are annual estimates based on national averages from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. “Homes powered” describes a quantity of electricity, not direct service to specific households. How we calculate this.