Ann Arbor office of Black & Veatch to play key role in developing wind farm
The company said July 28 it won a contract from Minnesota Power to develop a nearly 76-megawatt wind farm that the utility valued at about $180 million. Employees in Ann Arbor will join engineers from an office in Colorado in providing design engineering for the entire project, which will have the capability of powering 33,000 homes.
"We're designing that here in this office, and we're also doing other development support work for the utilities here in Michigan. We’re helping them develop wind farm projects,” said Kurt Westermann, renewable energy business director.
The project is welcome news for the company, which earlier this year saw about 5 percent of its local staff laid off as part of a wider round of layoffs in its global energy business.
Overland Park, Kan.-based Black & Veatch has had an Ann Arbor office since 1988 that currently employs around 250, Westermann said. It also maintains smaller offices in Detroit, Grand Rapids and Bingham Farms.
The local office, which also focuses on water infrastructure projects, has long been involved in renewable energy and has reallocated resources to grow the renewable energy unit, Westermann said.
“The market has changed the focus for us,” he said. “All the coal plants that were being developed have all been slowed down or cancelled. The coal business is pretty much flat on its back.
“Renewable energy is a very hot area right now.”
Among recent projects that the Ann Arbor office has designed are a 250-megawatt coal plant in Springfield, Ill. and a 550-megawatt, 2-on-1 combined cycle plant in Antioch, Calif. The latter plant takes waste heat from combustion turbines and uses it to power steam turbines to increase plant efficiency.
The local office also has worked on more than 10,000 megawatts of wind projects during the past five years, Westermann said. Most of the work has come from outside the state.
“We’re hoping to see some projects here in Michigan, both wind and solar,” he said.
While DTE Energy and Consumers Energy both are aiming to meet new renewable energy mandates primarily via wind farms, both utilities are planning to incorporate solar power into the mix.
Jackson-based Consumers Energy is setting up an experimental project in which it will pay a premium rate to residential, commercial or industrial users who generate their own solar energy, said Dave Ronk, director for transaction and resource planning. The program, meant to gauge customer response and the affects on distribution, is capped at 2 megawatts.
Of the 1,200 megawatts of renewable energy DTE is planning to add by 2015, 20 megawatts will come from solar installations, spokesman Scott Simons said.
“What we’re planning on doing is leasing rooftops from large commercial and industrial customers to put solar panels on,” said Simons, who added the plan isn’t yet developed.
Westermann said the company is also seeing opportunities in biomass energy projects.
“We’re seeing a lot of utility companies are looking at coal-firing wood with their coal, like a certain percent, so we’re seeing all brand-new biomass projects being developed, primarily in the South, Southeast, and in our area as well,” he said.
-Sven Gustafson writes about energy technology and other topics for Michigan Business Review. Contact him at (734) 302-1732 or sveng@mbusinessreview.com.
Photo: Kurt Westermannermann