E.ON increasingly committed to US renewables

E.ON says it is making “a strong commitment to the renewables market in the US and currently strengthening its position in the areas of new build projects, power purchase agreements (PPAs) and plant services.”

The company just began the construction of its Radford’s Run (formerly Twin Forks) wind farm in Macon County, Illinois, to be completed by the end of 2017. With 278 MW of installed capacity (139 Vestas 2 MW turbines) Radford’s Run will be the second largest wind farm in Illinois and E.ON’s third project in the state.

E.ON also reports signing of a further long term contract to secure sales of its renewable output: health-care multinational Johnson & Johnson has signed a 12-year PPA covering half of the output of E.ON’s 200 MW Colbeck’s Corner wind farm in the Texas Panhandle. This will amount to the equivalent of about 60% of Johnson & Johnson’s electricity consumption in the USA, and 25% globally.

In addition, Digital Realty, provider of data centre, colocation and interconnection services, has signed a long term agreement to take 400 000 MWh of Colbeck’s Corner’s annual output.

E.ON recently enlarged its presence in the US renewables plant services market with its selection by Lincoln Clean Energy to provide asset management and balance of plant services for its 253 MW Amazon Wind Farm Texas, near Snyder. This facility will sell 90% of the power generated to Amazon under a long-term contract.

A month previously, E.ON had signed an agreement with Novatus Energy to manage four of its wind farms, totalling more than 700 MW across three different states.

E.ON says it manages, owns or operates wind farms in seven states and in nearly every major Independent System Operator system of the USA.

• Siemens has also reported the award a further long-term contract for service and maintenance of US wind turbines, those at Puget Sound Energy’s Lower Snake River wind farm near Pomeroy, Garfield County, Washington State. Completed in early 2012, the 343 MW Lower Snake River farm consists of 149 SWT-2.3-101 wind turbines, which have been serviced and maintained by Siemens since beginning commercial operation in 2012. Under the new agreement, Siemens will provide service and maintenance for an additional ten years and install the company’s Power Boost and High Wind Ride Through® (HWRT) turbine upgrades to all 149 units. Power Boost raises the turbine output limitation under specific operating conditions, while HWRT prevents the turbine from shutting down immediately as wind speeds reach above 25m/s. This helps improve grid stability and replaces the high wind, fixed- threshold shutdown with “an intelligent, load- based reduction in output power to help avoid shutdown during high winds.”

Siemens says it currently provides service and maintenance for more than 4000 installed wind turbines in the Americas region, and more than 10000 globally, with a combined generating capacity of over 25 GW.