Investing in Solar

This is Copper Mountain Solar 1, nearly one million PV solar panels spread across 450 acres in Boulder City, Nev. Sempra U.S. Gas & Power will construct a third expansion of its Copper Mountain Solar complex, which the city of Los Angeles has contracted to supply power for 80,000 homes. Photo: Sempra U.S. Gas & Power, LLC.

On Dec. 6, 2012, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa signed two contracts to expand the city's use of solar power:

-a 25-year contract to purchase solar power from K Road Power from a yet-to-be-built 250-megawatt solar power plant across from the Moapa Travel Plaza truck stop on the Moapa River Indian Reservation 30 miles north of Las Vegas. The plant will have 910,000 solar panels spread over 2,000 acres on the 71,680-acre reservation that is populated by 320 Moapa Indians. The plant, expected to generate enough energy to power 118,000 L.A. homes, will also create 400 jobs during construction, and 20 permanent jobs once the plant is up and running.

-a 20-year, $95.7 million contract with Sempra U.S. Gas and Power for power from a yet-to-be-built 250 megawatt Mountain Solar 3 project in Boulder City, Nev. That electricity from solar will power 80,000 L.A. homes. Construction is expected to begin in 2014, create 300 construction jobs and 12 positions to operate the facility.

Under California's Renewable Portfolio Standard law, the L.A. Dept. of Water & Power (DWP), the nation's largest publicly-owned utility, must generate 25 percent of its power from renewable sources by 2016, and 33 percent by 2020. DWP reports L.A. currently gets 17.8 percent of its power from wind, solar and other renewable sources. Forty percent of L.A.'s power comes from coal plants in Arizona and Utah.

Sources: Daily News, Los Angeles; KCET.org; Las Vegas Review Journal; Sempra U.S. Gas & Power; DWP.