German and US developers Wpd and Scout Clean Energy have combined the development of two wind projects in Washington State previously developed by each company with solar energy and storage technology into an 850MW hybrid project.

The two companies with the Horse Heaven project in Benton Country aim at stabilising grids, increasing efficiency and enhancing the profitability of the overall project and make it more attractive for upcoming PPA negotiations.

Thanks to technological advances, the economic conditions are now in place to implement a wind-solar battery storage project in the tri-city metropolitan region, south of the cities of Kennewick, Richland and Pasco, Wpd said.

“In cooperation with Scout, we look to optimise and maximize the project for the community and the region,” said Niclas Fritsch, member of the board of Wpd wind projects Inc.

Jeffrey Wagner, chief executive of the company’s US unit added: “By combining assets and advancing a hybrid project ‘Horse Heaven’ can bring low cost, flexible, renewable resources to the local grid, and reach another milestone for clean energy supply in the region.”

Horse Heaven according to Scout Clean Energy's website originally was planned as a 600MW project, which will be scaled up to 850MW through the solar and storage elements, but Wpd told Recharge the companies at this stage could not communicate the details about individual sizes.

The wind farm according to Scout Clean Energy is expected to feature up to 235 GE turbines.

The project is slated to be brought online in two phases, with a first phase expected to start operations by late 2022, and a second phase no earlier than in late 2023.

Scout will be the main developer of the project, while Wpd after a cooperation agreement continues as long-term investor at Horse Heaven.

Wpd last year had sold assets to Scout including interconnection queue positions, land leases and wind data. These assets were combined with those held by Scout to best position the hybrid wind-solar-storage project for market.

Wind

Wpd and Scout Clean Energy team up for 850MW wind-solar-storage hybrid in the US