LCRA given nod for power line project
New power line projects in Gillespie County have officially been awarded to the Lower Colorado River Authority Transmission Services Corporation, according to a March 30 order from the Public Utility Commission of Texas.
Priority status has been given to local work that will bring renewable energy from McCamey in West Texas to a substation in Kerr or Gillespie County, then to an expanded Gillespie Substation and north toward Lampasas.
“Construction possibly could begin next summer,” Jess Totten, director of competitive marketing for the PUC said. “There is such a large amount of work to be done that some of it is going to be started early and finished early.”
The LCRA will hold public meetings in the late-spring or early-summer to talk with landowners about line routing.
Letters to impacted landowners will likely be mailed by the LCRA on April 20, according to Krista Umscheid-Ramirez, an LCRA spokeswoman.
The LCRA is among more than a dozen companies assigned by the commission to build more than 2,000 miles of new transmission lines across the state.
Transmission line construction is part of the PUC’s Competitive Renewable Energy Zones project which recommends wind farm locations across the state to increase the use of renewable energy.
The CREZ wind farm and power line projects were mandated by the state legislature in 2005.
Currently, the LCRA is conducting research to choose a preferred route for double-circuit 345-kV transmission lines that could be built through Kendall, Kerr, Kimble and Gillespie counties.
The company has until Oct. 7 to file for a certificate of convenience and necessity which is required by the PUC before any construction can begin.
By that fall deadline, the LCRA will have recommended priority line routes to the PUC along with suggested alternative routes.
Totten said that the PUC will process paperwork for the certificate as soon as it is filed. However, because landowners can contest proposed routes, Totten said the commission might not make a decision on final routing until April of 2010.
“Very generally, routes through urban and suburban areas can be highly contentious,” he said. “Routes through ranch areas tend to be less-contentious, but sometimes people have a special feature on their land they want to preserve.”
Because the LCRA construction is mandated by the state and requires a certificate of convenience of necessity, land along the final route can be taken through condemnation proceedings.
When the LCRA submits preferred and alternative routes, impacted landowners can file as intervenors to contest the route.
“Any potentially affected party along any of the routes submitted to the PUC can file as an intervenor,” Mrs. Umscheid-Ramirez said.
The commission will make the final decision on line routing but an administrative law judge will send a recommendation to the PUC after holding a hearing with landowners.
In all, the LCRA will build, own and operate about 600 miles of new and existing transmission lines that will cost nearly $700 million, according to a 2008 estimate by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. The council estimates that the project will cost $4.9 billion statewide.
LCRA projects that will likely come through Gillespie County are the McCamey D-to-Kendall, Kendall-to-Gillespie and Gillespie-to-Newton transmission lines. These lines will be constructed on double-circuit capable lattice structures and will be built using existing rights-of-way when possible, according to the LCRA.
Possible routes have not been determined but lines could run through the southern half of Gillespie County as well as the central part of the county north and south of Fredericksburg.
The LCRA has also been assigned two non-priority projects in West Texas and a non-priority upgrade project running from the existing Pitsburg Substation in Llano County to the existing Fort Mason Substation in Mason County.
The existing 69-kV transmission line will be upgraded to a 138-kV transmission line.
Further line routing information on the LCRA’s CREZ-related projects is available at www.lcra.org/crez.
9 April 2009
Tags: Wind power, Wind energy
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