Tri-State to participate in SunZia Transmission Project

Tri-State has joined as a participant in the SunZia Southwest Transmission Project.  The proposed project would be comprised of up to two 460-mile, 500-kilovolt lines extending from east-central New Mexico to east-central Arizona and designed to move 3,000-plus megawatts of electricity across the Southwest.

The SunZia project would strengthen the region’s electric system and support future development of power from renewable energy sources, such as geothermal, wind and solar, to be transported to the Arizona and New Mexico regional transmission systems.

“The SunZia project supports our regional transmission goals and could provide Tri-State with economical transmission capacity that provides significant value to our member cooperatives,” said Joel Bladow, Tri-State’s senior vice president of transmission.  “We will continue to evaluate the project as it moves forward.”

“Tri-State’s participation in SunZia further broadens the reach of the project, giving thousands of New Mexicans access to locally-produced renewable energy” said Tom Wray, SunZia’s project manager.

Other participants in the project are Energy Capital Projects, Salt River Project, SouthWestern Power Group, Tucson Electric Power and Shell Wind Energy, Inc.  SouthWestern Power Group is the transmission project developer and the project manager.  Tri-State is the only New Mexico utility-participant in the project.

Feasibility studies for the project began in June 2006 and the first phase of development and permitting began in February 2008.  If all permitting goes as planned the line is expected to be in service by the end of 2013.

According to the project’s preliminary study of corridors, the transmission lines would begin in New Mexico’s wind abundant plains in Lincoln, Torrance, Guadalupe and De Baca counties, extending east and south toward the town of Deming.  The lines would then go west in the area of Lordsburg, N.M., and cross into Arizona, eventually terminating at a substation east of Casa Grande, Ariz.

Updated: September 10, 2009