On October 5th, 2010 AEP Ohio (Gahanna, Ohio, US), New Harvest Power (Columbus, Ohio, US) and Agile Energy Inc. (San Bruno, California, US) announced plans for the largest solar photovoltaic (PV) development in the eastern half of the United States. Turning Point Solar LLC, a joint venture of New Harvest and Agile Energy, will develop the 49.9MW Turning Point PV plant on approximately 500 acres of former strip mine in Southeastern Ohio. The venture will construct the plant in three phases, with completion of the first 20MW phase planned by the end of 2012, another 15MW planned by the end of 2013, and 14.9MW by the end of 2014.
AEP Ohio to purchase RECs, electricity through PPA
Also on October 5th, 2010 AEP Ohio, a subsidiary of American Electric Power Company Inc. (Columbus, Ohio, US), entered into a memorandum of understanding towards an agreement to purchase the electricity from the facility through a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA). AEP Ohio will also purchase the renewable energy credits (RECs) from the facility, to help the utility meet its obligations under Ohio's renewable portfolio standard (RPS) policy. AEP Ohio has already met the RPS benchmarks for 2010 and 2011 through a long term PPA with the 10.8MW Wyandot Solar facility.
Turning Point is currently negotiating with Prius Energy SL (Albacete, Spain) and Isofotón SA (Malaga, Spain) towards the establishment of manufacturing facilities in Ohio to construct modules and tracking systems for the plant.
