Lucky Corridor, LLC has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Western Area Power Administration (Western), a power marketing administration in the U.S. Department of Energy, to explore the potential joint development of the 93-mile (150-km) 230-kV transmission line project in northern New Mexico.
The proposed project and associated upgraded facilities would make it possible to transport New Mexico's abundant renewable energy to electricity users across the Western states. The transmission line proposes to use existing pathways through private, state and federal lands in New Mexico to feed energy to Four Corners, a NYMEX hub, where it can be sold.
Lucky Corridor also has entered into an MOU with New Mexico's Renewable Energy Transmission Authority to help develop and fund the transmission project.
“I am so pleased to announce that we have cleared another hurdle in making the Lucky Corridor a reality,” said Lynn Chapman Greene, founder, president and CEO. “Once complete, the corridor will give ranchers and property owners in northern New Mexico the ability to ship electricity made from their renewable energy to Western states. It means more jobs, growth and opportunity for New Mexico and a cleaner energy future for our country.”
The New Mexico-Colorado border area enjoys first-rate average daily solar radiation and has some of the strongest and most reliable wind energy in the country.
Lucky Corridor was initiated by ranchers in Union County, New Mexico, and Trinchera, Colorado, working along with Greene. “Because of local ranchers' appreciation of their plentiful wind resource, they invested the bulk of the money necessary to meet all the development milestones we had to reach to enter into this agreement with Western,” said Greene.
Lucky Corridor has designed an infrastructure loop that upgrades an existing corridor. The upgrade proposes to move more than 1,000 MW of clean energy through Lucky's upgrade area into existing lines, including a proposed 850 MW that will move toward the Four Corners hub.
“Compared to other proposed transmission upgrades nationwide, which will bring new sources of abundant clean energy to consumers, ours is a small project at only 93 miles. Yet it accomplishes the same increased reliability and capacity goals as longer projects,” said Greene.
Visit www.luckycorridor.com.
