PSE to build Montana wind farm as coal-fired energy winds down - The Seattle Times

PSE to build Montana wind farm as coal-fired energy winds down | The Seattle Times

Puget Sound Energy, Washington’s largest private utility, plans to build a wind farm on the high plains in Stillwater County, Montana, that will be large enough to power more than 80,000 homes.

The 248-megawatt Beaver Creek wind farm is expected to begin generating electricity in 2025, when the investor-owned utility has said it will transfer its ownership stake in a Colstrip, Montana, coal plant that has long generated power for the Puget Sound region.

Under Washington state law, PSE and other utilities are required to stop using coal-fired power by 2025 and ditch the use of fossil fuels for electricity generation by 2045.

Last year, hydroelectric power accounted for 67% of Washington’s total electricity generation; natural gas, other renewables (mostly wind), nuclear and coal provide much of the rest, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

PSE serves some 1.2 million electric customers and about 900,000 natural gas customers mostly in northwest Washington. In 2020, the utility relied on coal and natural gas for half of its electricity generation.

“PSE is undergoing one of the largest clean energy transformations of any utility in the country,” Mary Kipp, president and CEO of PSE said in a statement. “Our priority is meeting our customers’ demand for clean energy while continuing to deliver the safe and reliable energy they also expect.”

In 2021, PSE signed a 20-year contract to purchase wind power from Montana’s largest wind farm, Clearwater Wind, which spans three counties of Southeast Montana.

The utility plans to eventually add wind turbines in neighboring Sweet Grass County, as well as a lithium-ion battery energy storage system to account for variable wind output. Output from wind varies hour by hour and minute by minute. This creates big challenges for utility managers, who must ensure that demand and supply are constantly in balance. Otherwise, they risk blackouts. So more energy storage could make power generation more consistent.

The project would rely on Montana wind, which blows strong in the winter when high pressure systems cause Washington wind farms to produce less energy, and demand in the Puget Sound region peaks, according to PSE.

For PSE and other utilities, one challenge in the transition to new energy sources is finding enough transmission line capacity to bring new sources of power to customers. In Montana, PSE will be able to use an existing line from the Colstrip coal plant to carry wind power to Washington.

Colstrip, one of the nation’s top carbon dioxide emitters located just north of the Northern Cheyenne Reservation, belched about 10.7 million metric tons of the climate warming gas in 2022. PSE is one of six utilities that owns a share of the Colstrip coal plant.

Only two of four Colstrip units are still producing electricity, and together they generate about 1,480 megawatts, according to PSE. The two other units were retired as a result of a 2016 settlement stemming from a lawsuit filed by the Sierra Club and Montana Environmental Information Center.

PSE is expanding its renewable energy sources in Montana, and recently entering a power purchase agreement with Energy Keepers, which generates hydroelectric power owned by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.

The wind farm is expected to generate up to 200 jobs during construction, slated for 2024, with an ongoing need for about 15 permanent staff during operation.