After Sparkling 2007-08 Planned Project Spending in Arkansas Approaches $5 Billion

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Industrial firms have been investing big dollars to expand and build new plants in Arkansas. Currently, 30 major projects are under construction totaling more than $3.8 billion. Late last year, AEP-Southwestern Electric Power Company (Shreveport, Louisiana) began construction of a grassroot coal-fired power plant in Fulton. The project, designed to produce 600 megawatts when completed in 2012, is estimated to cost in excess of $1.5 billion. Shaw Stone & Webster (Englewood, Colorado) is the engineering and construction firm on the project.

Welspun Gujarat Stahl Rohren Limited (Mumbai, India) completed construction last month on a new $150 million steel pipe mill in Little Rock, Arkansas. Following on the heels of this project is a competing project from another Indian firm, MAN Industries (India) Limited (Mumbai), which is scheduled to complete construction of a pipe mill in Little Rock this summer.

Click on the image at right to view a chart showing the breakdown of project spending by industry in Arkansas.

While construction activity remains brisk in early 2009, development of new projects is slowing only slightly, as there are currently less than $5 billion planned from 114 projects planned in the state. This compared to a survey conducted at the beginning of 2008 when 130 projects were planned totaling about $7 billion. For related information, see March 14, 2008, news article - Industrial Construction Robust in Arkansas - $7 Billion Planned.

Future industrial construction projects in Arkansas will be predominately energy related, including new power plant construction, alternative fuels plants and oil & natural gas pipeline work. For example, as part of the Tenark Pipeline System project, Ozark Gas Transmission LLC (Tulsa, Oklahoma) is permitting the construction of 105 miles of 36-inch-diameter natural gas pipeline in Oklahoma.

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Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is a marketing information service specializing in industrial process, energy and financial related markets with products and services ranging from industry news, analytics, forecasting, plant and project databases, as well as multimedia services.