LCRA adding solar power for wholesale electricity customers
The Lower Colorado River Authority is turning to the biggest energy source in the solar system to augment its electricity generation portfolio.
The LCRA announced July 11 it has signed a contract to add 141 megawatts of solar power to its lineup. Under the contract, the LCRA will purchase the renewable energy from a solar plant to be built in Borden County, located south of Lubbock.
According to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), one megawatt of electricity “can power about 200 Texas homes during periods of peak demand.”
Intersect Power is building the Juno solar power plant from which LCRA would be getting the solar electricity.
“We are pleased to be adding a significant amount of renewable energy to our portfolio,” said LCRA general manager Phil Wilson. “Our wholesale customers told us they were interested in renewable power that also makes sense economically, and we researched numerous options before determining the new Borden County solar power meets both those requirements.”
The solar power, which is expected to be available to wholesale customers in 2021, will augment the LCRA’s other renewable energy, including 295 megawatts from hydroelectric generation at dams along the Highland Lakes and 10 megawatts from a South Texas solar plant under construction.
Intersect Power as approximately 2 gigawatts of contracted late-stage projects in California and Texas with an overall 4 gigawatts of solar-powered projects.
The LCRA provides electricity to wholesale customers such as the Pedernales Electric Cooperative, the Bluebonnet Electric Cooperative, and several cities, including Burnet and Llano.
Go to the LCRA’s website to learn more about its power generation.
editor@thepicayune.com
3 thoughts on “LCRA adding solar power for wholesale electricity customers”
Comments are closed.
This is a smart move if the current pricing rules hold.
OK, so somebody at LCRA has bought into the globull warming scam. I hope PEC doesn’t follow suit. “renewable” energy does not work because it will never create as much energy as it took to make it (solar power, windmills), because there is no way to store energy, regular generating plants have to be kept on line 24/7/365 so there is not a random black out (how much solar energy is there at night?) and the cost of transmitting that energy (from the panhandle to the hill country) is never added to the real cost. The “renewable” energy will need to be replaced in 20 years or less and they are not readily “recyclable”. You want real “renewable” energy? Build nuke plants. They generate more energy over their 50-80 year lifespan by a factor of 75 times as much as windmills or solar panels. IOW solar is a scam and just used to line the pockets of the owners and fueled by the irrational fears of the ignorant.
Nuke plants are orders of magnitude more expensive than solar plants. Solar is cheap and economically viable and provides excellent peak load power, as does wind (which is why wind has reached coal production rates in Texas). You need to step away from whatever source that is feeding your BS.