For the first time in U.S, four companies will jointly invest $8-billion on a green energy initiative to bring great amounts of clean electricity to Los Angeles by 2023.
The four companies are Pathfinder Renewable Wind Energy, Magnum Energy, Dresser-Rand and Duke-American Transmission.
The project demands construction of a huge wind farm in Wyoming, an enormous energy storage facility in Utah, and a 525-mile electric transmission line that connect these two sites.
It is supposed to generate approx. 9.2 million megawatt-hours of power per year, twice the amount of electricity produced by hydroelectric dam in Nevada.
The four companies will together submit a proposal to the Southern California Public Power Authority by 2015 in response to the agency’s request for proposals to supply the Los Angeles area with renewable energy and electricity storage.
This would be the 21st century’s Hoover Dam, a landmark of the clean energy revolution, said Jeff Meyer, managing partner, Pathfinder Renewable Wind Energy, one of the four companies involved in the initiative.
The major facility of the project will be an underground energy storage facility that can yield 1,200 MW of electricity, enough to cater 1.2 million L.A homes. This underground storage will help to solve intermittency challenge.
Linking the wind farm to the energy storage facility make the the wind farm function like a coal, nuclear or natural gas power plant, capable of supplying electricity whenever needed.
In addition, the storage facility is expected to reduce the need of nearby utilities to install backup power plants and power lines to serve customers on emergency days.
editor@greentechlead.com