February 1, 2006
News Release 06-02
Brad Peck, Corporate Communications Officer
(509) 377-8247 / 727-2808
RICHLAND, Wash. – Energy Northwest’s Nine Canyon Wind Project south of Kennewick, Wash. set a new monthly electricity generation record at midnight last night.
The project’s 49 wind turbines produced 26,501,064 kilowatt-hours of electricity in January. The previous January record of 14,096,391 kilowatt-hours was set in 2004. The previous best month ever at Nine Canyon was March, 2004 at 20,739,140 kilowatt-hours. With wholesale spot power prices hovering around $65 per megawatt-hour, the record represents more than $1.7M worth of renewable energy for the region in January.
“Nine Canyon was projected to achieve an annual capacity factor of 31%, which is about average for a wind project,” said Terry Meade, Nine Canyon manager. The January capacity factor was 56.3 %. A 100 percent capacity factor would require all the turbines to be producing full power all the time. Unlike hydro, nuclear, coal and other forms of power generation, wind projects only make electricity when the wind is blowing, and typically only produce full power when the wind is steady at about 8 or more miles per hour.
“We can’t control the wind, but we can affect the amount of power produced by ensuring our turbines are ready to run whenever the wind arrives. Historically our Nine Canyon turbines have been online and ready to run better than 98 percent of the time,” Meade said.
Each of the project’s turbines has a maximum output of 1.3 megawatts of power.
The Nine Canyon Wind Project was completed in two phases. Phase I began operations in September, 2002, with Phase II completed in December, 2004.
As a public power agency, Energy Northwest builds and operates power generation projects for its members and other public power organizations. Participants in each project share the power produced and related project costs.
Energy Northwest is currently developing a 50-60 megawatt wind project west of Spokane near the town of Reardan, Wash., as well as other wind power sites in the region. The agency is also developing a modern 600 megawatt Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle power plant near Kalama, Wash. Named the Pacific Mountain Energy Center, the facility will gasify solid feed-stocks like coal and petroleum coke to produce a clean-burning, hydrogen-based synthesis gas that will fuel two 300 megawatt power plants.
There are currently two IGCC plants operating in the United States. The Energy Northwest project, slated to be operational by 2012, is one of only five presently under development in the country.