400 MW Gordon Butte Pumped Storage Project: Alstom To Supply Equipment

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Alstom and GB Energy Park LLC have agreed that Alstom will supply equipment for a very large pumped storage project planned in Montana.

gordonbutter

“We’re excited to welcome Alstom to be the equipment supplier for the facility. Absaroka Energy is committed to continuing Montana’s leadership of integrating renewable energy resources and providing reliable energy to the region,” explained Carl Borgquist, president of Absaroka Energy.

The Gordon Butte Project will have an installed capacity of 400 MW and could generate 1,300 GWh per year. Reservoirs 1,000 feet wide and 4,000 feet long with depths up to 75 feet will be employed. The project will support the grid for the Northern Great Plains and Pacific Northwest, by providing energy storage and stability. The technology that will be installed can generate electricity in a matter of seconds, rather than what the old technology’s responsiveness was, which was measured in minutes. The project location is south-central Montana on private land.

Amid the flurry of stories about energy storage in the form of batteries like the Tesla Powerwall, it seems pumped storage press has been marginalized somewhat. (There was, however, a fairly recent story on CleanTechnica about a much bigger project in California.)

This particular project has a website of its own, www.gordonbuttepumpedstorage.com, so you can check out any updates or peruse other info if you are interested.

The complete project team is fairly large:

  • Absaroka Energy LLC (Executive Team)
  • McMillen Jacobs Associates (Steve Padula)
  • Garcia and Associates (Pamela Spinelli)
  • Hyrdo Solutions Inc. (Tom and Luke Osborne)
  • DOWL HKM (Phillip Odegard)
  • Stanley Consultants (Martin Weber)
  • HDR Inc. (Ed Weber, Rick Miller)
  • Aqua Energie LLC (Kevin Candee)
  • Cobb Crest LLC (Steve Laufenberg)
  • Pascoe Energy (Bill Pascoe)
  • Barnard
  • AECOM
  • Alstom Power Inc.

There is over 90 GW of pumped storage in operation around the world, so it is a proven technology. It also has been utilized in various forms for over 100 years.

Image Credit: Gordon Butte Project


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Jake Richardson

Hello, I have been writing online for some time, and enjoy the outdoors. If you like, you can follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/JakeRsol

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