The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission plans an Aug. 21 drawing to see which of two prospective developers gets the right to a preliminary permit on a hydro project on the Ohio River between Ohio and West Virginia.
The commission received two preliminary permit applications deemed filed on March 1 at 8:30 a.m. for proposed projects to be located at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ New Cumberland Locks and Dam on the Ohio River, near the town of New Cumberland, Hancock County, W.Va., and Jefferson County, Ohio. The applications were filed by Lock+ Hydro Friends Fund XXX LLC and FFP Project 121 LLC.
On Aug. 21, the Secretary of the Commission, or her designee, will conduct a random drawing to determine the filing priority of the applicants. The priority established by this drawing will be used to determine which applicant, between those with identical filing times, will be considered to have the first-filed application, the commission said in an Aug. 7 notice.
The sole purpose of a preliminary permit, if issued, is to grant the permit holder priority to file a license application during the permit term.
Lock+ Hydro Friends Fund XXX’s application is for a successive preliminary permit, meaning it has had one before. Its proposed project would include 17 turbines each having a nameplate capacity of 1.5 MW, with a total installed capacity of 25.5 MW. The project would have an estimated annual generation of 145,850 megawatt-hours.
FFP Project 121’s proposed project would include three new 16.6-MW horizontal bulb turbine-generators having a total combined capacity of 49.8 MW. The project would have an estimated annual generation of 251,600 megawatt-hours.The project company is a unit of Boston-based Free Flow Power, which is pursuing a number of hydro projects around the country.
