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$1bn Oregon wind farm grows by 24 turbines

Biglow Canyon Wind Farm is PGE's first fully-owned wind power project

The first turbines in a 175-megawatt wind farm expansion project in Oregon have begun generating electricity.

Portland General Electric Company is adding 76 turbines to its Biglow Canyon Wind Farm, in the third phase of the $1 billion wind farm.

It said yesterday that 24 turbines are now generating power in the expansion at the wind farm in the Columbia River Gorge near Wasco, in Sherman County.

Work on the third phase began in April, and is expected to be completed by the end of September bringing the wind farm’s generating capacity up to 450MW.

Jim Piro, PGE President and CEO, said: “Bringing the first turbines of the final phase of Biglow Canyon Wind Farm online represents a big step in developing more renewable energy resources for our customers and for the growing wind energy development in the region.

“We expect to have the entire 450MW wind farm online on time and on budget.”

Biglow

The Biglow Canyon project is PGE’s first fully-owned wind power facility, with the first 76 turbines coming online in December 2007 and a further 65 turbines added in August 2009.

The project is using 2.3MW wind turbines from German manufacturer Siemens, and was originally developed by Orion Energy LLC.

The utility, which serves 817,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers in Oregon, said that with the variability of the wind, it expected the completed wind farm to provide an average of 150MW generating capacity.

This would be enough to supply 125,000 Oregon homes with power, it said.