Another 240 MW Wind Power Online for Texas Customers

San Antonio, Texas [RenewableEnergyAccess.com] With 181 new wind turbines currently operating and online at the Cottonwood Creek Wind Farm southwest of Sweetwater, Texas, another 240 megawatts (MW) of wind power capacity is now available to CPS Energy customers.

“We broke ground on the Cottonwood Creek expansion last fall, and now that the new turbines are up and running, we have 340 MW of capacity from this site alone,” said Raul Cardenas, CPS Energy wholesale power marketing analyst. CPS Energy signed a 20-year agreement with Babcock & Brown and Catamount Energy, renewable energy facility developers and operators to obtain the additional supply of electricity. In addition to Cottonwood Creek, CPS Energy already buys all the electricity generated — a maximum of 160 MW — from the Desert Sky Wind Farm near Iraan in West Texas. Now, CPS Energy has a combined total of 500 MW of wind energy, the equivalent of a large conventional electrical generating unit. “CPS Energy’s goal is to meet 15 percent of our customers’ peak electrical demand with renewable energy such as wind power by 2020, “said General Manager and CEO Milton Lee. “Now, with more wind energy online, along with other renewable sources including solar and landfill gas, we are slightly above 11 percent. So we are definitely on the way to meeting our lofty 2020 goal, and we’re one of only a handful of utility systems across the country that has surpassed the double-digit percentage mark for renewable energy.” CPS Energy customers can support clean, renewable wind energy by subscribing to Windtricity that’s sold in 100-kilowatt-hour blocks for $3 each. Customers can buy as many blocks as they choose up to the amount of energy they use, and the cost of each block purchased is added to the customer’s monthly electric bill. A block will supply about 10 percent of the energy used in the average San Antonio home.