Leaning Juniper I

» See our response to public comments on this project

Leaning Juniper I is the first wind project in the Columbia River Gorge. The project benefits climate change strategies by reducing the amount of greenhouse gases produced in the public electricity grid, by substituting fossil fuel based power with clean renewable power.

The project’s first came online on in September 2006, and a second phase of the project will quadruple the sites capacity to over 400 MW.

TerraPass funds would help ensure an adequate financial return for the project and satisfy the expectation project developers had about the voluntary market supporting the project. In addition, TerraPass funding is directed to PacifiCorp, one of the more progressive wind-supporting utilities.

This project meets the Green-e Energy standards.

Project details

Leaning Juniper I wind project was a PPM wind facility built for sale to PacifiCorp. The Facility is sited three miles southwest of Arlington, Oregon, in the Columbia River Gorge.

The project spans approximately 5,000 acres of buffer lands adjacent to the Arlington landfill, which is operated by Waste Management. The land will continue to be used for wheat farming and grazing.

The Leaning Juniper project is situated near existing Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) transmission lines, which provide access to multiple markets.

Sixty-seven 1.5 megawatt GE turbines provide a total nameplate capacity of 100.5MW. A capacity factor of 42% has been reported, showing the facility to benefit from excellent wind resources.

Construction started May 30, 2006. COD Date was September, 2006.

The site was developed by PPM energy as one of the first facilities in its build to sell model. On July 28, 2006, PacifiCorp bought the wind farm, while it was still under construction. PPM supplies operational services and a warranty for the first two years of project operation.

The land is owned by Waste Management, and their two megawatt landfill gas to energy project will share transmission assets.

A future development called Leaning Juniper II will expand the site up to another approximately 300MW.

Project location

The project is located in South Arlington, in Gilliam County, Oregon. No Satellite view of the facility yet exists.

Other environmental and social benefits

Environmental benefits

• The wind facility displaced growth in the WECC region with clean renewable energy.

Social benefits

• Lease payments are made to local landholders, typically a few thousand dollars. A typical turbine takes half and acre out of service, which would earn the farmer $100 per year if used to cultivate winter wheat.
• Local employment for construction related to the project, installation of equipment, and operation of the Project.
• Property taxes for local county are forecast to be about $7K per turbine. Forecasts are that for local counties across the Columbia River Gorge, wind farms could soon account for 20% of their tax revenue.¹

Project’s ability to foster further greenhouse gas emissions reductions

• The wind farm has led to the development of a new 550MW substation built to hand the needs of more wind development in the Gorge. The substation will also ease transmission for a landfill gas to energy project hosted on the same lands.

Discussion of appropriate use of TerraPass funds

The project is an ideal candidate for TerraPass funds as planned carbon revenues clearly were a decisive factor in helping a path breaking project that significantly and permanently reduces greenhouse emissions.

Baseline conditions

As with all wind farms, the Baseline conditions are those of the surrounding public grid.

The facility is located in the WECC region of the National Electricy Reliablity Council, and in the newly released Green-e Climate Protocol for renewable energy has a modeled carbon intensity of 1295 lbs/MWh. We use this figure to determine the translation from MWh to lbs CO2.

Additionality

No regulatory requirements. Oregon has no requirements for renewable power that are effective for the transaction period. US wind not used to satisfy an RPS requirement is often considered additional by analysis of their aggregate economics and adoption profiles.

The project is The RPS in Oregon (SB 838) has the following schedule:

• 5% by 2011
• 15% by 2015
• 20% by 2020
• 25% by 2025

The RPS has provisions for voluntary market programs not counting for RPS compliance. Oregon is also a member of the Western Climate Initiative. Neither of these regulations is effective for the time period and vintage of the transaction under consideration, although the RPS does allow banking from previous time periods for eligible facilities, but ODOE draft rules suggest Jan 1, 2008 as the eligible start date for banking.

U.S. wind not used to satisfy an RPS requirement is often considered additional by analysis of their aggregate economics and adoption profiles. This project meets the eligibility criteria of all the following performance standard protocols: Green-e Energy and the Chicago Climate Exchange Offset Protocol. The project will be certified against the standards of the Green-e Energy Protocol.

Barriers to Implementation. This project is one of the first wind farms in the Columbia River George and broke the path for a major transmission investment to open the region to wind development. As such, the facility faced early market and technology barriers. Other alternatives open to the facility, such as continuing to build less expensive fossil-fuel based electrical generating capacity, were not prevented by these barriers.

Impact of TerraPass funds. TerraPass seeks projects where the funding from our purchases helps assure a positive financial outlook on the greenhouse gas emission reduction project. No project level financials were disclosed. However, PacifiCorp’s 2007 IRP², characterizes the renewable commitments in the context of uncertain regulation and uses scenario analysis with carbon “ladder levels” of $0, $8, $15, $38 and $61 a ton, showing carbon revenues (or burdens) were clearly factored into the planning decision. Like many PacifiCorp facilities, PacifiCorp uses this facility for a voluntary marketing program, showing that voluntary market support is used as a factor in these facilities.

Better than most. TerraPass seeks projects where the operations have shown good practices and avoided substantial negative impacts. Leaning Juniper went through an expedited planning process, but the sister facility has completed a full EIS. Additionally, as a path breaking project, Leaning Juniper inspired a new substation that will enable future wind projects in the Gorge.

Footnotes

1. Note that a OR state ruling may change the way these amounts are calculated.
2. The Integrated Resources Plan (IRP) provides a comprehensive 10-year planning framework and is built through stakeholder involvement and filed with all state PUCs.