Texas agency okays 8 zones for new wind projects

Reuters News

HOUSTON, July 20, 2007 - Texas electric regulators voted on Friday to designate eight zones as the best sites for construction of new power lines to serve more than 20,000 megawatts of proposed wind generation, an agency spokesman said.

After evaluating the potential for wind-generation in about 25 areas in the state, the Texas Public Utility Commission agreed to designate eight areas as "Competitive Renewable Energy Zones." or CREZ zones, said PUC spokesman Terry Hadley.

"It's a really good day for wind industry in Texas - for economic development and for air quality," said Susan Williams Sloan of the American Wind Energy Association, a trade group for the wind industry.

Once finalized, the commission ruling will allow the state's electric grid operator to begin studies of specific transmission routes for power lines to serve proposed wind farms to be built by other firms, Hadley said.

"It is an astonishing testament to the wind resources available in our state to have aggregate expressions of interest in constructing 24,511 MW of wind generation", PUC chairman Paul Hudson said in a memo.

Transmission companies that have proposed new lines in the state include a joint venture created by American Electric Power Co., and units of ITC Holdings Corp., FPL Group, AES, BP Wind, Shell WindEnergy, privately held Sharyland Utilities, TXU Corp. and CenterPoint Energy Inc.

Texas surpassed California last year as the U.S. state with the most wind generation at more than 2,300 megawatts, but future development has been hampered by the lack of transmission lines to move power from the windy, western half of Texas to more populated areas in the eastern half of the state, like Dallas and San Antonio.

The CREZ process will integrate transmission planning with new generation projects, sources said.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which oversees the transmission network that supplies power to a majority of the state, has requests to connect more than 28,000 MW of new wind generation, more than one-third of its total requests from new power plants that want to join the grid.

About 1,500 MW of new wind generation is scheduled to be completed this year in Texas, according to ERCOT.

Transmission proposals considered by the commission included use of direct-current transmission links to better control power flow and the construction of power lines that extend beyond the ERCOT border into the Texas panhandle, which has significant wind potential.

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