INDEPENDENCE, Mo. (AP) — A coal-fired power plant owned by a suburban Kansas City utility is on standby as Independence Power and Light officials decide what to do with the aging facility.

IPL switched its larger Blue Valley plant to natural gas this summer ahead of federal emissions regulations going into place early next year. But company spokesman Leon Daggett says its Missouri City plant would cost too much to convert.

The Independence Examiner reports a consultant estimated it would cost the utility $925,000 to decommission the plant and more than $17 million to dismantle it.

Daggett says converting the plant to burn either natural gas or biomass would be considerably more expensive than that.