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In its first 10 months serving Portland General Electric (PGE) customers, the Clearwater Wind Energy Center contributed to new records for PGE wind generation, including helping the company produce 1 GW of power from wind sources alone—a new milestone. 1 GW (or 1,000 MW) is enough electricity to power the equivalent of 830,000 homes, or about half the number of homes in Oregon. The Clearwater Wind Energy Center, located in Rosebud, Custer, and Garfield counties in Eastern Montana, was developed in four phases by a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Resources LLC, which operates and owns part of the facility. PGE owns 208 MW of the center and purchases an additional 103 MW through a power purchase agreement (PPA), supplying customers a total of 311 MW.
The portions of the facility serving PGE customers achieved commercial operations by January 2024 and take advantage of consistent winds from the vast plains of the Treasure State (Figure 1). Alongside other renewable energy projects in the Pacific Northwest, the Clearwater Wind Energy Center adds diversity and consistency to PGE’s energy portfolio, allowing the company to source power for customers when it’s available from a variety of resource types and locations. [caption id="attachment_225359" align="aligncenter" width="740"]
1. PGE owns 208 MW of the Clearwater Wind Energy Center and purchases an additional 103 MW through a power purchase agreement, supplying customers a total of 311 MW. Courtesy: Portland General Electric[/caption] With Montana’s abundant and consistent wind, the Clearwater Wind Energy Center delivers high levels of production during the winter and summer, allowing PGE to serve Oregon customers additional reliable clean energy during periods of high demand. In January 2024, PGE’s owned and contracted wind facilities produced a maximum output of more than 1 GW of wind power for the first time, thanks in large part to the addition of the Clearwater Wind Energy Center. This milestone was achieved again on another 25 days throughout 2024, including on February 26, when PGE reached its all-time record for maximum wind generation at 1,056 MW (Figure 2). In addition to the Clearwater Wind Energy Center, which consistently contributes about 34% of PGE’s daily wind generation, PGE also operates wind facilities in the Columbia River Gorge. [caption id="attachment_225361" align="aligncenter" width="740"]
2. PGE’s weekly maximum wind generation from owned and contracted facilities, before and after Clearwater’s addition. Courtesy: Portland General Electric[/caption] The Clearwater Wind Energy Center was selected through PGE’s 2021 Request for Proposal, a competitive bidding process through which the company solicits proposals for electricity generation facilities that bring value to customers. “In just a few short years, we were able to take the Clearwater Wind Energy Center from a proposal on paper to the efficient, productive facility it is today,” PGE President and CEO Maria Pope said at an event in September celebrating the commissioning of the facility. “This plant is an example of how working together, we can act quickly to solve some of the biggest challenges facing the energy industry.” The emissions-free power generated at the facility is delivered to PGE customers through existing transmission lines (Figure 3) on Northwestern and Bonneville Power Administration’s system, as well as an approximately 100-mile generation-tie line connecting to the Colstrip substation. The wind center’s addition to PGE’s generation portfolio also reduces the need to purchase potentially costly or greenhouse gas-emitting resources from the open energy market, and takes advantage of federal production tax credits available to renewable energy projects. [caption id="attachment_225358" align="aligncenter" width="740"]