Platte River Power Authority’s Board of Directors has approved the purchase of 28 MW of additional wind energy from the Spring Canyon Energy Center (Spring Canyon) in Logan County, Colorado.
Platte River contracted with an affiliate of Invenergy Wind LLC (Invenergy) in May of 2013 to purchase 32 MW from the second phase of Spring Canyon, the Spring Canyon II Energy Center (Spring Canyon II). Spring Canyon II is currently under construction, with commercial operation of the facility expected in the fourth quarter of this year.
The additional 28 MW of wind power will be generated at a third project phase to be called the Spring Canyon III Energy Center (Spring Canyon III). Platte River will be purchasing the full 60 MW from Spring Canyon II and III – from 35 wind turbines – with all new wind generation to be on line by the end of this year.
Both Spring Canyon II and III are sited near Invenergy’s original Spring Canyon Energy facility, a 60 MW project in operation since 2006.
“The purchase of the additional wind energy supports Platte River’s strategic initiative to further diversify our generation resource mix,” said Jackie Sargent, Platte River General Manager and CEO. “Platte River is implementing direction from the Board by increasing our wind portfolio by 400 percent. The 60 MW Spring Canyon expansion project will increase our wind energy supply to about nine percent of the power consumed annually in our four owner municipalities—Estes Park, Fort Collins, Longmont and Loveland. Including hydropower resources, the total portion of energy supplied to the municipalities from non-fossil resources will be approximately 30 percent. We’re also actively investigating solar development at the Rawhide Energy Station.” Sargent added that Platte River is working on an Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) to identify options to further diversify generation resources used to serve the four cities. “These projects support our efforts to meet our strategic objectives and are in line with direction from our Board,” said Sargent.