THE ENERGY CRUNCH: ELECTRICITY IN A BOX

Thursday, May 3, 2001 By THOMAS RYLL, Columbian staff writer

So far, it's been smooth sailing for a fast-track project to put 50 generators to work near Vancouver Lake. That's more than can be said for what must have been a rough ocean ride for the first power units to arrive at Clark Public Utilities' site on Wednesday morning.

Utility engineers, consultants and contractors have been working against the clock to get the units up and running by July 1 as a partial solution to Clark's piece of the regional energy crisis.

The rapid-fire work is on time, and so was the first generator to arrive from Portland by truck Wednesday.

Technicians unlocked the 40-foot-long shipping container housing the generator and found evidence that the trip from Austria, where the equipment is manufactured, was a maximum Dramamine-dose event.

There were broken clamps, sheared pipes, snapped bolts and a film of spilled engine coolant on the container floor. "They stack them on the ship, and once it gets rolling during storms, things move around. Those generators are top-heavy," said a General Electric technician.

All told, the damage was minor and workers set out unpackaging, repairing and preparing the first units of what will become a generator "farm" next door to the utility's River Road Generating Plant.

The unprecedented demand for electricity in the face of this year's drought and looming summer shortages put the utility in competition with others up and down the West Coast for temporary generating capacity.

Clark spent $19.5 million to lease the 50 generators from General Electric Energy Rentals for one year. The deal was inked in February, before some of the equipment was even manufactured and sent on its long journey.

The utility has a two-month gap, in August and September, in its power supply. The goal is to have all 50 units broken in and running around the clock by July 1.

Utilities in Tacoma and Wenatchee, among others, opted for diesel-fueled generators. With a natural gas supply already available at the River Road plant, Clark went with the cleaner-burning fuel.

Even so, the utility has yet to receive a permit from the Southwest Clean Air Agency for the project. "We're in contact with them daily," said Andy Huck, Clark's operations director.

As for the project itself, "We're looking good," said Huck as he watched the first generator land on a base of a half-dozen timbers Wednesday.

The generators will remain in their noise-insulated shipping-container housings for the duration. Each unit produces about one megawatt of electricity; the 50-megawatt total output is about 10 percent of the average power demand from Clark's 153,000 customers.

A few dozen feet to the east of the generator site sits the River Road plant, with a 248-megawatt output.

Thirty generators arrived in Portland by rail from the Port of Tacoma; 17 are still shipboard, and GE must come up with the rest, Huck said.

Installation will be done at the rate of five a day if possible. Workers continue to route natural gas lines and must also connect the equipment to a network of power cables buried beneath the newly spread acre of rock that constitutes the "farm" site.

The time line calls for the units to be run, 10 at a time, beginning June 15. After a 100-hour initial servicing, the equipment is designed to run 2,000 hours 83 days nonstop before scheduled maintenance.

Power from the generators is expected to cost about $150 a megawatt-hour.

While that is a fraction of the $325-a-megawatt-hour contract Clark has for 140 megawatts of Kaiser Aluminum electricity in August and September, the $150 is at least double the cost of power from the River Road plant and six times the price of electricity from two low-priced contracts that end in July.

http://www.columbian.com/05032001/clark_co/192853.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 04, 2001

Answers

And what, pray tell are these babies going to run on? Diesel? Natural Gas? Coal Dust? Wood Chips? I wonder what the resulting power will really cost. I read an estimate today that if all the expected NG powered electrical plants come on stream they would consume ALL of Canada's NG reserves in 6-8 years! Ciao KJ

-- Kevin Jepson (kevijeps@telusplanet.net), May 04, 2001.

After re-reading I guess it is natural gas.

With a natural gas supply already available at the River Road plant, Clark went with the cleaner-burning fuel.

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 04, 2001.