CenterPoint Energy Inc. (NYSE: CNP) has finished construction on an electric transmission line in greater Houston as part of a previously announced project to help bring additional power to the growing region.
The Houston-based energy delivery company powered up its 60-mile, 345-kilovolt electric transmission line — called the Brazos Valley Connection — on March 29, according to a recent press release. The project’s cost was around $285 million and is projected to add up to 20 cents per month on customers’ bills, given they use 1,000-kilowatt hours of power a month.
The line begins in Grimes County at the Texas Municipal Power Agency’s Gibbons Creek Substation, runs through Waller County and ends at CenterPoint’s Zenith Substation in Harris County, per a map on the project’s website.
Local construction company North Houston Pole Line was the general contractor for the Brazos Valley Connection, according to the project’s website.
The CenterPoint’s Brazos Valley Connection project is just one part of the Houston Import Project, a $590 million plan that includes building a 130-mile 345-kV electric transmission line from Limestone County to Harris County as well as upgrading existing lines and three substations.
Cross Texas Transmission and Garland Power & Light are developing the northern part of the project, which runs from Limestone to Grimes counties.
The Houston Import Project was first identified and endorsed by Austin-based Electric Reliability Council of Texas in April 2014 to import more energy to the Houston region due to its growing population. According to recently released Census Bureau data, the area’s population grew from 5.92 million in 2010 to 6.89 million in 2017, an increase of more than 16 percent.
“What this (project) does is it helps continue to assure businesses that they can house, they can site their operation and people can live in this service territory without increased fear of having power outages. That’s the bigger gain. They have to be comfortable that their power is going to continue to be reliable and readily available out into the future. That’s the message you create by doing this project.”
-CenterPoint CEO and President Scott Prochazka
The Public Utility Commission of Texas approved the Houston Import Project in December 2015, according to the Houston Chronicle. A final order authorizing construction was approved in April 2016, and construction on the Brazos Valley Connection began in February 2017, per the project’s website. The entire Houston Import Project is projected to be completed by June 2018.
Before the Houston Import Project was approved, it received opposition from local power companies NRG Energy Inc. (NYSE: NRG) and Calpine Corp., which argued the project was too costly, unnecessary and invasive of private property. NRG proceeded to break ground on its own $150 million project in 2014 to meet energy demands in the Bayou City.
