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Great River Energy Files Resource Plan, Commits to Conservation and Efficiency

Posted on: Wednesday, 9 July 2008, 12:00 CDT

Great River Energy filed its 2008 resource plan with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission on July 1. The plan, which analyzes the future electricity needs of Great River Energy's 28 member cooperatives, identifies the need to add approximately 1,800 MW (megawatts) of generating resources over the next 18 years to satisfy increasing member demand for electricity. However, Great River Energy plans to first aggressively pursue conservation and efficiency to reduce future resource needs.

"We consider conservation and efficiency to be our 'first fuel,'" states Glen Skarbakka, manager, resource planning, Great River Energy. "We, in partnership with our member cooperatives, are committed to helping consumers make the most of the energy they use and thereby reduce the need for new generation resources."

The resource plan also outlines what resources are currently available to Great River Energy and how the organization will consider new resources for the future. Great River Energy is on course to meet Minnesota's Renewable Energy Standard; however, the cooperative will require an additional 1,000 MW of nameplate wind capacity by 2025 to meet the 25 percent standard, if met entirely by wind.

Great River Energy has a fleet of modern, flexible peaking power plants that help accommodate intermittent wind resources. The organization plans to make modest additions of natural gas-fueled generators to this fleet during the next 10 years. Great River Energy will also continue to pursue low-carbon resources such as power plants that burn biomass to generate electricity, combined heat and power projects, and efficiency improvements in existing power plants. Additional baseload resources (power plants that generate electricity round the clock) will be needed in the 2020 timeframe.

In its capacity expansion modeling, Great River Energy considered the future costs of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, the increasing cost of all fuel types as well as the changing cost to build new power plants. "Dealing with uncertainties about the future, particularly with respect to pending policies on CO2 emissions, was our foremost concern in developing our resource plan," says Skarbakka. "Therefore, we've developed a flexible plan that will allow us to adjust as we get new information or circumstances change."

The complete text for Great River Energy's 2008 resource plan can be found at http://www.greatriverenergy.com/projects/future_plans/proj_future.html .

About Great River Energy

Great River Energy provides wholesale electricity to more than 1.7 million people via 28 distribution cooperatives in Minnesota and Wisconsin. With more than $2.3 billion in assets, Great River Energy is the second largest utility in the state, based on generating capacity, and the fifth largest generation and transmission (G&T) cooperative in the United States. Great River Energy's member cooperatives range from those in the outer-ring suburbs of the Twin Cities to the Arrowhead region of Minnesota to the farmland of southwestern Minnesota. Great River Energy's largest distribution cooperative serves more than 120,000 member-consumers; the smallest serves just over 2,400.

Source: Business Wire

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