Dry Lake Wind Power Project

Project details

Phase 1 (34°39′36″N 110°17′03″W / 34.66000°N 110.28417°W) consists of 30 Suzlon 2.1 MW wind turbines, for a total nameplate capacity of 63 MW. Iberdrola Renewables built the wind farm for $100 million. Based on wind measurements before construction began, Iberdrola estimated phase 1 would produce an average of 132,450 MWh annually. Depending on actual performance of phase 1, the company planned to install up to 209 more turbines in future construction phases.

Phase 2 (34°36′22″N 110°10′24″W / 34.60611°N 110.17333°W) consists of 31 additional Suzlon turbines for a combined nameplate capacity of 65.1 MW. The location of phase 2 is about seven miles (11 km) northwest of Snowflake and three miles (4.8 km) southeast of phase 1.

Electricity production

(*) partial year of operation

Environmental effect

According to the USDOE, each 1000 MW of wind power capacity installed in Arizona will save 818 million US gallons (3,100,000 m³) of water per year and eliminate 2.0 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions. Phase 1 of Dry Lake Wind Power Project would then eliminate:

${\displaystyle \frac{2,000,000\text{ tons}\times 63\text{ MW}}{1000\text{ MW}}=126,000\text{ tons}}$

of carbon dioxide, and save:

${\displaystyle \frac{818,000,000\text{ gallons}\times 63\text{ MW}}{1000\text{ MW}}=51,534,000\text{ gallons}}$

of water annually.