| Chevron Technology to build New Mexico power plant |
3/8/2010 |
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BY MICHAEL BURNHAM, E&E SENIOR REPORTERGreenwireUpdated: 03-1-2010 11:30 am
Chevron Corp.'s emerging technologies unit will build the largest U.S. power plant that uses lenses to focus sunlight onto photovoltaic cells, company officials said yesterday.
Chevron Technology Ventures will build the 1 megawatt concentrating photovoltaic power array on the tailing site of Chevron Mining Inc.'s molybdenum mine in Questa, N.M. The project will use lenses --- instead of mirrors, like those employed at solar thermal arrays --- to focus sunlight onto 175 photovoltaic panels.
Germany's Concentrix Solar GmbH will provide the concentrating photovoltaic system. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Chevron plans to break ground on the 20-acre project this spring and complete construction by the end of the year. The company will simultaneously evaluate various soil cover depths for the closure of the tailing facility at the end of mining operations.
Chevron will sell the array's power to the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative, which serves about 30,000 members in three northern New Mexico counties.
The array will be the largest concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) installation in the United States and one of the largest in the world, Chevron Technology Ventures President Des King said. The technology is expected to work best in areas such as New Mexico's desert, which have high direct solar radiation.
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| ADOT: Arizona’s ARRA transportation funds fully obligated |
3/8/2010 |
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Phoenix Business Journal - by Jan Buchholz
The Arizona Department of Transportation and local government entities have obligated the entire $522 million received as the state’s share of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds.
“Obligated” does not mean “awarded,” however, according to ADOT spokeswoman Laura Douglas.
“We’ve obligated the money, and those projects are ready to move forward,” she said.
Douglas said ADOT’s portion, $350 million, has been obligated. Because of cost savings with the bidding process, additional projects have been added to those originally awarded.
ARRA provisions required that the entire $522 million be allocated by March 2, and it was, according to a written statement released by Gov. Jan Brewer. Though ADOT distributes all state transportation monies under ARRA, Douglas was not sure how the money and projects being administered by local governments is being tracked.
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| Stimulus fuels $21M project in S.F.'s Tenderloin |
3/8/2010 |
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| San Francisco Business Times - by J.K. Dineen
The Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation will close financing and start construction this week on the $21 million rehabilitation of two senior-occupied buildings at 165 Turk St. and 249 Eddy St.
The projects, which are a block from each other in the Tenderloin neighborhood, will be San Francisco’s first construction project built with ARRA (“American Reinvestment and Recovery Act” or stimulus) funds. The projects received $11.1 million in stimulus money.
Both buildings house a 100 percent Section 8 low-income senior population. TNDC purchased the properties in 2007 because the buildings’ Section 8 contracts were set to expire in 2010 and the previous private owner expressed an interest in selling the buildings to a private investor who wanted to convert them to market rate housing. The potential conversion to market-rate rents would have displaced the senior resident population.
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| States meet deadline for U.S. highway stimulus funds |
3/8/2010 |
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WASHINGTONMon Mar 1, 2010 2:16pm EST
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - All of the $26.6 billion in U.S. stimulus money for highway projects has been obligated, or committed to specific projects, Vice President Joe Biden said on Monday.
State transportation departments will likely try to get the money flowing to contractors quickly, as legislation to fund federal highway projects outside of the stimulus act has been held up in the Senate.
According to the vice president's office, all states by February 26 had met Tuesday's deadline to commit a total of $26.6 billion to highway projects.
"Because these projects were funded on-time and, in many cases, under-budget, we're going to be able to put even more people to work improving our highways just as the spring construction season kicks into high-gear," Biden said in a statement.
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| Boldt Co. takes on big California medical building projects for Sutter Health |
3/8/2010 |
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| By Pete Bach • Post-Crescent staff writer • February 28, 2010
The Boldt Co. is gaining a foothold in California. While that's not unusual in itself — the Appleton-based construction giant has performed big jobs in 47 of the 50 states — the scope and challenge of the work, all in the medical field, puts the firm's ventures in the Golden State into a class by themselves.
The company has forged a link with the Sacramento-based Sutter Health organization, a relationship that bloomed after the major health network learned more about Boldt's acclaimed lean building practices.
At present, major projects in San Francisco and Sacramento command all the attention the company can give them. The largest of these, Cathedral Hill Hospital, is a new hospital to be built to meet the earthquake-prone state's exacting seismic regulations.
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| California firm gets Arizona Memorial job |
3/8/2010 |
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Pacific Business News (Honolulu)
California-based Hal Hays Construction Inc. received $7.2 million under a previously awarded contract to build a new visitor parking lot for the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor Naval Base.
The work for the Naval Facilities Engineering Command at Pearl Harbor will include an access road and drop-off area, sidewalks, chain link fencing and gates, drainage improvements, lighting, closed-circuit television and landscaping.
The project is funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
Construction is expected to be completed by March 2011.
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| Stimulus money will spur construction on California high-speed rail project, officials say |
3/1/2010 |
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| The $2.25 billion will pay to finish engineering and environmental reviews and provide seed money to start building the Anaheim-to-San Francisco route. Others say major hurdles remain for the project.
January 29, 2010|By Dan Weikel
The $2.25 billion in federal stimulus funds awarded this week to the California high-speed rail project ensures that construction can proceed on a 520-mile route between Anaheim and San Francisco within three years, rail officials said Thursday.
Mehdi Morshed, executive director of the California High-Speed Rail Authority, said the infusion of federal dollars would pay for completion of the project's engineering and environmental reviews and provide a significant amount of seed money to start building the system by September 2012, as required by the federal grant.
"We have been aggressively pushing the environmental and engineering work on this project," Morshed said. "We didn't have assurances we would have money for construction. Now we do."
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| Solar power project in Mojave Desert gets $1.4 billion boost from stimulus funds |
3/1/2010 |
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| By Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The Energy Department on Monday announced a "conditional" $1.4 billion loan guarantee for a solar thermal power complex in the Mojave Desert that would ultimately produce as much as 392 megawatts of electricity.
The loan guarantee would be drawn from the resources given to the Energy Department under the economic stimulus bill adopted last year. While the terms of the solar loan guarantee -- like the terms of nuclear loan guarantees announced last week -- are still being negotiated, the Obama administration highlighted the jobs it said would be created.
BrightSource, the project developer, estimates that during the construction phase, the solar power complex will employ about 1,000 people. Operation of the plant will require 86 permanent jobs. BrightSource's construction contractor is negotiating labor agreements with various trade unions, the Energy Department said.
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| Planned Calif. Power Plant Would Include GHG Limits |
3/1/2010 |
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| By ROBIN BRAVENDER AND COLIN SULLIVAN
Published: February 4, 2010
Calpine Corp. is poised to build the first U.S. power plant with federal limits on greenhouse gas emissions in California after clearing a final regulatory hurdle today.
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District granted the Houston-based utility its final air quality permit today, allowing the company to proceed with the planned construction of a 600-megawatt natural gas-fired Russell City Energy Center. The 15-acre project site is in Hayward, just east of the San Francisco Bay.
The Russell City plant will produce 50 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than even the most advanced coal-fired plants, Calpine said, and will emit 25 percent fewer heat-trapping gases than the California Public Utilities Commission's standard. Construction on the facility plant is expected to begin later this year.
"We applaud the BAAQMD and Calpine for going beyond existing federal law and being the first in the nation to require an enforceable greenhouse gas limit," said Linda Adams, secretary of the California EPA. "This action furthers efforts at a statewide level to balance our economic needs while meeting our environmental challenges."
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| Cal Lutheran gets $5 million for stadium from Ventura County developer |
3/1/2010 |
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February 22, 2010 |
California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks will be getting a new 3,000-seat football stadium, thanks to a $5-million donation from Ventura County real estate developer William Rolland. The gift, announced Monday, is the largest single donation to the school.
Construction of the $8-million stadium is expected to begin this summer and be finished for the 2011 football season, a university spokeswoman said. If other donations for the remaining $3 million are not raised by summer, the university will borrow the money to ensure that building starts on time, she said.
The stadium will be named after Rolland, who is not a Cal Lutheran alumnus. A former Los Angeles city firefighter who won acclaim for a mudslide rescue in 1969, he is known for philanthropy that aids families of firefighters injured or killed in the line of duty. |
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| Road from Gallup to Shiprock gets $31M |
3/1/2010 |
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Posted At : February 23, 2010 3:24 PM
Related Categories: General Construction, New Mexico
Road from Gallup to Shiprock gets $31M
Associated Press - February 18, 2010 7:05 AM ET
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - The Navajo Nation has received $31 million to continue reconstruction of U.S. 491 in McKinley and San Juan counties, an effort to expand the highway from two to four lanes between Gallup and Shiprock.
Gov. Bill Richardson says the money comes from federal stimulus spending.
Last year, the New Mexico Transportation Department broke ground. Work includes adding a lane in each direction and reconstruction of the existing roadway.
Richardson calls the project "a major boost for western New Mexico" because it will improve highway safety and create construction jobs.
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