Largest J920 FleXtra project in North America provides peaking power solution
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Largest J920 FleXtra project in North America provides peaking power solution Sky Global Power One power plant Colorado County, Texas, U.S.A. High efficiency cuts fuel and operating costs Six of GE's ultra-fast, natural gas-fired Jenbacher J920 FleXtra generator sets are powering the 51 MW Sky Global Power One power plant, which opened in April 2016 in Colorado County, TX, as the largest J920 FleXtra project in North America. The GE units, which also are designed to provide baseload power and combined heat and power (CHP) in industrial settings, deliver high efficiency that reduces fuel consumption and lifetime operational costs. The plant implements a long-term partnership between owner-operator Sky Global Partners and the San Bernard Electric Cooperative (SBEC) to provide peaking power to SBEC, which supplies electricity to more than 18,000 members in a seven-county region in south central Texas. “The excellent electrical efficiency of GE's J920 FleXtra gas engine adds up to big savings in fuel over the life cycle of a plant,” observes Carlos Lange, President of GE's Distributed Power business. “Over 15 years, a U.S. facility could realize fuel savings of as much as $15 million for a 100 MW J920 FleXtra power plant with very high simple-cycle efficiency and great flexibility. As our launch partners for the 60 Hz J920 FleXtra gas engine, Sky Global and San Bernard will benefit from the unit's ability to provide utilities and industrial customers with fast, reliable, onsite power during peak power demand periods and as more renewable energy is added to the grid.”

With Texas accounting for one-tenth of total U.S. energy use, and the state’s population growing steadily, power supply is having a hard timing keep up with the growing frequency of peak events. Sky Global required a high-performance generating solution that furnished clean, affordable energy, operational flexibility, dependability in emergencies, and capabilities that supported the dynamic ERCOT (Electric Reliability Council of Texas) electricity exchange and its potential to increase revenues. GE’s J920 FleXtra gas engines meet those criteria. Not only do the 8.6 MW units efficiently...