San Diego Gas & Electric has signed and submitted for approval a second 20-year power purchase agreement with an LS Power subsidiary to buy up to an additional 45MW of solar photovoltaic-based energy from the proposed Centinela Solar Energy facility, which will be located on a 1350-acre site near Calexico in California’s Imperial Valley. The contract is subject to California Public Utilities Commission approval.
Wacker Chemie has signed a PPA with Fesil group for the acquisition of its silicon-metal production site based in Holla, Norway. The transaction will still require the approval of Wacker's supervisory board and Fesil's board of directors as well as clearance by the antitrust authorities.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has approved two 25-year power purchase agreements between Pacific Gas and Electric and BrightSource Energy for electricity generated at a pair of concentrating solar-thermal power stations scheduled to be built in the deserts of Southern California. The initial project, a 110MW power plant in Ivanpah Solar Power Complex, will be located on six square miles of land about 50 miles northwest of Needles in the Mojave Desert and is slated to begin operations by July 2012. A second, 200MW installation is scheduled to start operating a year later at the site.
With outline plans for three 242MW solar thermal power plants, the recent signing of power purchase agreements between Solar Millennium, LLC, and Southern California Edison is a boon for California’s solar industry. The agreements detail the construction of two 242MW solar thermal plants, with the option to proceed with the third, subject to approval of the California Public Utilities Commission. Operation of the three parabolic trough solar power projects is expected to begin in 2013-14.
