Enercon turbines for 100 MW wind plant in British Columbia
AltaGas Income Trust has contracted Enercon for the supply and installation of 34 of the German manufacturer's E82 wind turbines at its Bear Mountain project site near Dawson Creek in north-eastern British Columbia. The capacity rating of each turbine is subject to a confidentiality agreement with Enercon, says Altagas spokesman CJ Wilkins, although he did say the total size of the wind farm will be about 100 MW. Site work for Bear Mountain, expected to cost C$190 million, began in late 2007, with completion scheduled for November 2009. The project, which won a power purchase agreement from BC Hydro in 2007, was originally planned as a 120 MW facility utilising 57 turbines. "We looked at the project at 120 MW and thought there might be some optimisation we could do. Over the last several months we've been doing that and decided that 34 turbines would be the right number," says Wilkins. "It increases the megawatt capacity relative to the number of machines, the footprint of the actual project is decreased by more that 25% and is down now to about 25 hectares, it lowers the capital cost per megawatt for us and also reduces the potential environmental impact, in particular with birds and bats, because there will be about 40% less swept area by the rotors and a significant increase in turbine spacing along the ridge."
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