Western Wind Energy Corp. Opens 106 MW Wind Farm in California

Western Wind Energy Corporation has switched on the newest addition to its wind power portfolio.

Ten months after breaking ground on 1,850 acres of land in Tehachapi, California, RMT has completed construction and Gamesa is set to commission the first 106 megawatts of wind turbines for the $255.5 million Windstar I wind energy facility. 

The remaining 14 MW is expected to come online in February of next year. The first phase of the Windstar I installation alone more than doubles Western Wind's entire operational wind energy capacity. Commissioning Windstar I will likely cap an end to a busy three months for the Vancouver-based wind energy developer.

In September, the company announced it's Kingman Wind farm had become operational. Kingman represents the first fully integrated combined wind and solar energy generation facility in North America. This news was followed two weeks later by an unsolicited take over bid from Ontario-based Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp., which caused Western Wind's stock to skyrocket nearly 70%.

In response to the bid, which Western Wind asserted was a "low ball offer," the company quickly formed a special committee "to consider any formal offer, if any, that may be put forward and to consider other alternatives that may be available to Western Wind Energy."

At the end of October, the company began negotiating a 100 MW wind project located in the southern United States. Finally, in a relatively quiet November, Western Wind released its Q3 2011 financials that revealed revenues in the year's first nine months just slightly above the same time period in 2010.

Now, in December, Western Wind will begin delivering clean, renewable energy to Southern California Edison through a long term power purchase agreement and, perhaps more importantly, generate more revenue.

Image Credit: OliBac via Flickr