Swinerton Renewable Energy has been awarded an EPC contract from K Road Moapa Solar for a 250MW PV plant in Nevada, US, following a competitive selection process.
The project will be located 30 miles northeast of Las Vegas on the Moapa Paiutes' tribal land. It will represent the first utility scale solar project constructed on tribal land in the US, which refers to property owned by Native Americans.
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Under the terms of the contract, Swinerton will design, engineer, build and procure equipment for the project. The company will begin designing the project immediately and expects to break ground in June.
The project will be situated on an 809 hectare site, which accounts for around 3% of the tribe’s 29,120 hectares of land that is held in trust by the US government. It is expected to create 400 jobs during peak construction and up to 15-20 permanent jobs.
The plant is expected to be commissioned in multiple phases, with the ability to produce and deliver electricity by May 2014. The plant will be connected to the grid supplying electricity to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) under a 25-year power purchase agreement.
Completion is slated for 2015, after which Swinterton will operate and maintain the PV plant for 10 years providing a performance generation guarantee.
“We are honoured to partner with K Road Power on this ground-breaking project,” said George Hershman, Vice President and Division Manager for Swinerton Renewable Energy. “We have immense respect for K Road Power and a long history of partnering with tribal reservations on construction projects. We believe that we share common values and goals and look forward to providing direct and indirect employment opportunities for tribal members, and to producing clean power to benefit the Moapa Tribe as soon as possible.”