“There will be significant jobs during the construction of
the Laurel Generating Station with opportunities for Montanans for employment,
as well as to provide services and supplies. At the peak of construction there
is expected to be between 250 - 300 people working on the Laurel Generating
Station,” said NorthWestern spokesperson Jo Dee Black in an email. “We
anticipate and hope a significant portion of the work will be done by
Montanans.”
It will take 10 people to run the plant, Black said. The
location won't be disclosed until later this month.
The gas-fired power plant designed by Caterpillar is a
reciprocating internal combustion engine, or RICE unit, which can fire up or
shut off when needed. Additionally, the utility contracted for 100 megawatts of
hydropower from a subsidiary of BC Hydro, a Canadian-owned company.
The Montana Public Service Commission this month will get
its first look at Laurel Generating Station, plus a 50-megawatt battery storage
facility NorthWestern says will be located in Billings. The contract for the
battery storage project is pending. The company involved hasn’t been
identified.
The battery storage project will bank power from all energy
sources when electricity is ample, then flow back onto the grid when energy
demand is high. Storage is often associated with renewable energy, which
doesn’t necessarily sync up with consumer demand. NorthWestern’s storage will
not be dedicated specifically to renewable energy.
All told, NorthWestern is adding 325 megawatts of new
dispatchable capacity.
The commission will have the chance to compare the projects
selected to those that weren’t.
In the past few weeks, businesses who responded to
NorthWestern’s request for proposals have asked the PSC keep details about
their submitted projects private for proprietary reasons.
Among bidders self-identifying are: NextEra, which is
developing a 750-megawatt wind farm in Custer, Rosebud and Garfield counties;
Broadview Solar II, a 300-megawatt solar farm planned west of Billings near
Broadview; Gordon Butte Energy Park, a 400-megawatt pumped storage hydro
facility in Meagher County; and Mitsubishi Power America, which proposed a
green hydrogen production and storage, a solar farm and gas-fired peaking power
plant and a combined cycle gas generator. Mitsubishi has proposed converting
water to hydrogen in Butte, where it would build an electrolyzing plant.
There were 180 proposals submitted from 21 different
bidders, according to NorthWestern. The projects were evaluated by Aion energy.
There’s been no mention of Colstrip Power Plant being
considered as a future flexible capacity resource in the competitive selection
process. At about the same time the request for proposals was issued,
NorthWestern had requested pre-approval to acquire additional share of Colstrip
Unit 4, in which the utility already has a 30% stake.
NorthWestern is only identifying bidders with proposals that
resulted in contracts at this time, it told Lee Montana Newspapers.
In seeking the additional Colstrip share in 2020,
NorthWestern Energy Director Long-Term Resources Bleau LaFave testified that
the 185 megawatt share of Colstrip Unit 4 offered to NorthWestern by Puget
Sound Energy would be available for flexible generation and provide the ability
to ramp up and down to balance load and intermittent generation. All 185
megawatts would have been available for peaking capacity during the entire time
of the operation.
The proposed 2020 Colstrip purchase was pursued as an
“opportunity resource,” that is to say an existing resource that has become
available and not one that gets compared competitively to alternatives. That
proposal was withdrawn by NorthWestern and Puget.
