Mohave Sun Power, LLC (Mohave Sun Power) has formed a single-purpose company, Hualapai Valley Solar LLC, to develop a 340 megawatt (MW) solar project using parabolic trough solar technology with molten salt storage in Mohave county, Arizona. The project is striving to design, permit and finance the project in the third quarter of 2010 and is expected to begin the construction phase in the fourth quarter of 2010. The company is expecting the plant to be operational in the second half of 2013.
Financing for the proposed project would be funded largely with stimulus money. The generated energy reserves from the project would be purchased by one or more utilities in California, Nevada, Arizona and Colorado through a negotiated power purchase agreement.
“We have been working on this for over a year,” Mohave County Supervisor Buster Johnson, R-Dist. 3, said Sunday during a telephone interview. Johnson credits Don Van Brunt, former executive director of Mohave county economic development division, for his instrumental efforts in propelling the huge project forward.
The proposed solar project site is proposed to be located about 25 miles north of Kingman on about 4000 acres of land. The project could create as many as 1,500 jobs during the two-and-a-half to three year construction stage and at least 100 full-time jobs for plant operations once completed, Mohave Sun Solar documents said.
Additionally, the county and state will see additional benefits from goods and services purchased for the project, taxes generated by employment, property taxes, and other taxes paid to that state and local governments.
“This would just be the beginning…there are other projects in the works to go along with this,” said Johnson. Mohave county has the opportunity to attract other renewable energy projects or supporting industries by establishing a reputation of treating such endeavors fairly and efficiently, Johnson explained.
Currently, the project organizers are working to satisfy the requirements set forth by the National Environmental Policy Act process to analyze the environmental, cultural, and social impacts and benefits. The other regulating agencies for the project include Arizona Department of Environmental Quality and Arizona Department of Water Resources.
Johnson said that the representatives of the project will meet with the Arizona Corporation Commission with the hope of acquiring a Certificate of Environmental Compatibility.
The project will require an amendment to the county’s general plan, which was filed in March 2009, and will be subject to the discretion of the Mohave County Board of Supervisors in upcoming general meetings.
Mohave Sun Power said that the public will have opportunities to provide input in regard to the project and the various public entities that will be permitting the progression of the project. Initial public meetings are expected in June 2009.
The solar project is the second one of its kind proposed to anchor in Mohave county, the first being the Albaisa Corporation’s 200MW solar project also proposed for development in the Kingman area.