Nice.
They will be building a lot of these
Under a bright winter sun Wednesday, CPS Energy CEO Doyle Beneby introduced the companies selected to build one of the country’s largest solar projects and a solar manufacturing plant in San Antonio, an investment of more than $100 million.
OCI Solar Power, whose parent is a South Korean chemical company, will build the solar farms, using panels from a factory to be built here by Nexolon, another South Korean firm with close ties to OCI and a builder of solar cell components.
Both companies will open headquarters in San Antonio, part of their larger commitment to bring at least 800 jobs to town with a $38-$40 million payroll. Mayor Julián Castro said at a news conference that the average pay would be $47,000.
That does not include the temporary construction jobs that will be created to build the multiple solar farms, most of which will be in CPS Energy’s service territory. Together, they will generate 400 megawatts of zero-emission electricity — enough to power 80,000 homes.
See here for some background, and CPS’ homepage for more. As an earlier story notes, this is for a 25-year deal, and the price CPS will be charged for the energy generated will reportedly be on the order of 11 or 12 cents per megawatt. Not too shabby.
Apparently, this deal has some folks in Austin a little envious.
But as Austin Energy is set to begin public hearings tonight on its proposed rate increase, solar advocate Tom “Smitty” Smith said solar energy proponents will urge the Austin City Council to copy the San Antonio model.
“The race is on” to become a manufacturing hub, Smith said. “They are going to beat us, unless Austin takes action quickly.”
If the two cities get into a race like that, I daresay the residents of both will win. Too bad we can’t do that here in Houston, since we don’t own our utility like they do. But at least we’re free of the yoke of burdensome government regulations. That’s worth something, isn’t it?