Structural Erection on Lea County’s 550 MW Combined Cycle Plant Begins

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas). New Mexico’s newest natural gas combined-cycle power station celebrated the commencement of the structural erection portion of the project with a ground breaking ceremony yesterday at the plant location in Hobbs, New Mexico. Attending the event were several state and local government officials, employees with Arclight Energy Partners (Boston, Massachusetts) (parent company of Lea County Power Partner’s LLC), employees from Genova Power Company (Plano, Texas), as well as Colorado Energy Management Company (CEM) (Lafayette, Colorado) who were hired to develop and construct the $300 million power plant.

The Lea County Combined Cycle Project is designed to supplement the region’s energy resources during the summer heat, and to address future system capacity needs. Located in Hobbs, New Mexico the station utilizes two GE MS7001FA combustion turbines with two heat recovery steam generators, and a GE steam turbine. The plant will also be outfitted with the latest NOx reduction equipment to keep environmental emissions to a minimum. Construction began in November 2006 with Burns & Roe (Oradell, New Jersey) contracted to oversee the engineering of the station, and CEM acting as its own general contractor with subcontracts award to various companies such as Alcon for civil construction and LPR Construction (Loveland, Colorado) for structural erection. The station is now on target to begin commercial operations June 1, 2008.

A majority of the plant equipment was supplied by the purchasing and dismantlement of the McAdams Generating Station in Sallis, Mississippi, from its owner TECO Power Services for an undisclosed amount. Once dismantled, the equipment was loaded onto 36 railcars and shipped approximately 800 miles to the Lea county area, where it was off loaded and trucked the rest of the way. Once operational, the plant will sell its power to Southwestern Public Service Company, a branch of Xcel Energy Corporation through a 25 year power purchase agreement.

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