UPDATE - SRP clinches 500 MW of solar PPAs

The Sain Solar park in Arizona operated by NextEra Energy Resources. Image by: Salt River Project (SRP).

Electric utility Salt River Project (SRP) on Thursday announced it has contracted 500 MW of solar projects in Arizona, the bulk of which will support the operations of a local data centre planned by social media giant Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB).

SRP has signed power purchase agreements (PPA) with three counterparties that are proposing to install photovoltaic (PV) capacity in Arizona’s Pinal County -- power generation group AES Corp (NYSE:AES), EDP Renewables North America LLC and NextEra Energy Resources, the clean energy business of NextEra Energy Inc (NYSE:NEE). The capacity is due to become operational in 2022 and 2023.

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Facebook will be the largest power off-taker of the projects with a commitment to buy the output from 450 MW of the overall capacity. The electricity will go to its new data centre in Mesa.

Details about the PPAs and the contracted projects are available in the table.

PPA counterparty	Project name	Capacity (MW)	Power for Facebook	Construction start	Planned commissioning
AES	West Line Solar	100	50	Spring of 2022	October 2022
EDPR	Randolph Solar	200	200	Autumn of 2022	2023
NextEra	Valley Farms Solar	200	200	Winter of 2022	December 2023

From the West Line solar park, Facebook will get only 50 MW, while power from the remaining 50 MW will be available to SRP's residential and small business clients.

The three deals back SRP’s goal to add 2,025 MW of new utility-scale solar to its system by the end of fiscal year 2025, which was recently expanded from an earlier 1,000-MW commitment.