#invenergy

I posted a story yesterday that the trump cabal cancelled a loan to the developer of a electricity transmission line that is designed to transmit electricity from wind-generated power to midwestern and eastern states from wind farms in the Great Plains. Well, now we learn that the developer is going ahead with the project, regardless.

Excerpt from this story from the Associated Press (AP):

The Trump administration on Wednesday canceled a $4.9 billion federal loan guarantee for a new high-voltage transmission line for delivering solar and wind-generated electricity from the Midwest to the eastern U.S., but the company indicated that project would go forward anyway.

The U.S. Department of Energy declared that it is “not critical for the federal government to have a role” in the first phase of Chicago-based Invenergy’s planned Grain Belt Express. The department also questioned whether the $11 billion project could meet the financial conditions required for a loan guarantee.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly derided wind and solar energy as unreliable and opposed efforts to combat climate change by moving away from fossil fuels. The Department of Energy also said Wednesday that the conditional commitment to Invenergy in November was among billions of dollars’ worth of commitments “rushed out the doors” by former President Joe Biden’s administration after Biden lost the election.

A federal loan guarantee generally makes borrowing money less costly. A statement issued for the Grain Belt Express expressed disappointment, calling the new transmission line “America’s largest power pipeline.” Construction has been set to start next year.

The statement added: “A privately financed Grain Belt Express transmission superhighway will advance President Trump’s agenda of American energy and technology dominance while delivering billions of dollars in energy cost savings, strengthening grid reliability and resiliency, and creating thousands of American jobs.”

Invenergy has said its project would create 4,000 jobs and new efficiencies in delivering power, and that it would save consumers $52 billion over 15 years. The line would deliver electricity from western Kansas about 800 miles (1,287 kilometers), across Missouri and Illinois and into Indiana, connecting there to the power grid for the eastern U.S. It could deliver up to 5,000 megawatts of electricity.

“When electricity demand and consumer power bills are soaring, it’s hard to imagine a more backward move,” said Bob Keefe, executive director of E2, a nonpartisan, Washington-based group supporting renewable energy.

Excerpt from this New York Times story:

The Energy Department on Wednesday said it had terminated a commitment to provide a $4.9 billion loan guarantee to a company building a contentious transmission line across the Midwest.

The cancellation may imperil the $11 billion project, known as Grain Belt Express, which would cross 800 miles of farmland and is designed to carry electricity generated by wind farms in Kansas to population centers in Illinois and Indiana.

It is the kind of infrastructure that experts say is necessary to update America’s aging electrical grid at a time of rising energy demand. If built, it would be the largest privately funded transmission line in the country’s history.

But the project, which is being developed by the Chicago-based company, Invenergy, has drawn intense backlash from some landowners and Republican lawmakers.

This month, in a conversation with President Trump in the Oval Office, Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, pressed Mr. Trump to cancel the loan commitment. At Mr. Trump’s urging, Senator Hawley said, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said he would do so.

In a statement, the Energy Department said that it determined “that the conditions necessary to issue the guarantee are unlikely to be met and it is not critical for the federal government to have a role in supporting this project.”

It added that “to ensure more responsible stewardship of taxpayer resources,” the department “has terminated its conditional commitment.”

In a statement, Jamie Geller, vice president of corporate communications for Invenergy, said the company is disappointed in the loan guarantee cancellation. But, she said, “a privately financed Grain Belt Express transmission superhighway will advance President Trump’s agenda of American energy and technology dominance,” save billions of dollars in energy costs, improve the grid and create thousands of American jobs.

The Grain Belt Express project has been in the works for more than a decade. For the past several years, Invenergy worked to secure agreements from regulators in all four states the line would traverse, as well as landowners.

Updated [hour]:[minute] [AMPM] [timezone], [monthFull] [day], [year]   TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Trump administration on Wednesday canceled a $4.9 billion federal loan guarantee for a new high-voltage transmission line for delivering solar and wind-generated electricity from the Midwest to the eastern U.S., but the company indicated that project would go forward anyway. The U.S. Department of…

Excerpt from this story from Times New Record:

A leading private developer and operator of sustainable energy solutions, Invenergy, announced Nov. 18 the construction of a 1,310-megawatt solar-energy facility in Northeast Texas.

The Samson Solar Energy Center will be the largest solar-energy project in the United States and will support sustainability goals for three Texas municipalities and five major consumer brands.

When completed, the center will provide power for AT&T, Honda, McDonald’s, Google, Home Depot, and the cities of Bryan, Denton and Garland.

“Invenergy continues to lead the energy transition, and this record-setting project demonstrates our expertise at a new scale,” said Ted Romaine, Senior Vice President of Origination at Invenergy. “The Samson Solar Energy Center is the latest example of what can be achieved when companies and utilities seek an innovative partner to meet their sustainability goals and invest in a clean energy future.”

Invenergy’s senior vice president Kris Zadlo said he does not expect storage to rival the scale of Invenergy’s wind or solar businesses.

“If we want to grow the solar business, we have to be in the storage business, because the two are synonymous now.” he said.

#EnergyStorage #Invenergy #UtilityScale #SolarStorage #Arizona

Invenergy’s senior vice president Kris Zadlo said he does not expect storage to rival the scale of Invenergy’s wind or solar businesses.

“If we want to grow the solar business, we have to be in the storage business, because the two are synonymous now.” he said.

#EnergyStorage #Invenergy #UtilityScale #SolarStorage #Arizona