A new energy-sector industrial facility, located on the other side of the McAdoo Wind Farm’s Cottonwood Substation from Argo Blockchain’s Helios plant, plans to break ground this fall at a ten-acre site that has already been secured.
Broad Reach Power, a Texas-based firm headquartered in Houston, expects construction scheduled to begin this October, with a commercial operations date of October 2023.
According to Greg Blue, vice-president of development, Broad Reach Power has the largest operating fleet of Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) in Texas.
BESS developers represent what could be called the second wave in the evolution of renewable energy which is a focus on energy storage, said Blue. Since 2020 more than two dozen companies have begun developing battery energy storage systems across the state.
Blue puts it this way: “We’re here to help. Our Battery Energy Storage Systems add to the grid’s reliability, lower risks of power blackouts, enable more low cost renewable power to come online, and relieve transmission congestion—which is one of the causes of high prices.”
Broad Reach, formed in 2019, has two primary group of investors: Encap Investments, which has institutional funds of more than $38 billion, according to their website; and Apollo Global Management, a publicly traded company (APO, NYSE), with $513 billion in assets, according to their website.
Broad Reach Power/Dickens will be a 200-megawatt facility, one of the company’s biggest, Blue said, describing it as “about the size of a power plant.” Broad Reach Power currently has 17 BESS projects in Texas.
Plans for Broad Reach in Dickens include, according to Blue, to hire about 125 people in the construction phase, “not at once, but through the life of the construction phase,” he said.
“We will try to hire locally and buy materials and supply locally, too,” Blue said. He noted that the firm plans to host a job fair this fall.
Broad Reach locates many of their facilities in rural areas, especially where there are preexisting renewable energy facilities. They have been working on their plans for Dickens County for about two years, and brought a proposal to the county commission about a year ago. The commission last month granted the firm its request for a Section 313 tax abatement. The terms of that agreement have not yet been released.
ERCOT studies take about 12 months to determine if the grid can accommodate energy from a BESS in this area, Blue said.
In the meantime, Patton Springs ISD entered into an agreement in May with a solar energy project affecting property in its district; the application was filed with Texas Comptroller’s Office May 7. Developments such as this one in a region already will served by wind energy and crypto mining/green data, battery storage facilities would seem to be a natural outgrowth.
Once the Broad Reach/ Dickens facility is built out, it will be managed remotely. “What we bring is construction jobs and construction spend during the build,” Blue said. He added, “We have a facility in Abernathy and we might have a regional person keep tabs on both. We just have to see.”
Blue said that Broad Reach Power is excited to be in Dickens County and is looking forward to being a supportive member of the community. “We are very interested in a community service project similar to what Argo did with the pool,” Blue said in closing.
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