MID Board Report Archive

Modesto Irrigation District (MID) Board Meeting of Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2007
Contact: MID Public Affairs Department, Kate Hora, 209 526-7454
The next MID Board meetings will be Sept. 25 and October 16, 23 and 30, 2007.

Staff and director reports

Water report

• Walt Ward, Assistant General Manager for Water Operations, reported that the first storm of the fall season is off the coast of Alaska and should move into the Central Valley by Thursday. The storm system is unusually strong for this time of year. The Hetch Hetchy system is at 69 percent of capacity, while elevation in Don Pedro Reservoir has dropped to 760 feet. Reservoir managers are trying to shape an “attraction pulse” of water to send down the Tuolumne River for Chinook salmon returning to spawn this fall MID has tried and largely succeeded in maintaining an 18-20 foot elevation in Modesto Reservoir much of the s summer. This is an accommodation for the safety of recreational users of the reservoir, such as water skiers.

Don Pedro Board of Control report

• Director Hensley reported that the Labor Day weekend was another sellout with every campground filled to capacity. A total of 847 future reservations were booked in August. Plans are in place for installation of a new 50,000-gallon water tank at Blue Oaks.

Approved by majority vote

• A partnership agreement with the Modesto Bee under which MID customer service staff will offer new electric customers, or customers who are moving to a new address,  newspaper subscriptions at a reduced rate. MID will receive a small revenue stream in exchange for this service. The agreement is in alignment with MID’s practice of partnering with both public and private organizations where appropriate and beneficial to ratepayers.

Informational workshops

Electric Resources Workshop
Resource Planning and Development Manager Greg Salyer gave an overview of MID's base and peaking load forecast for the year 2011.

MID is a summer-peaking utility with loads typical of Central Valley electric utilities such as Turlock Irrigation District and Sacramento Municipal Utility District. Staff's forecast of base load in 2011 is approximately 265 megawatts (MW). This amount of power will be needed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. By 2012, MID will need an additional 50-75 MW of base load capacity.

MID must also serve a forecast peak load of 795 MW plus 15 percent planning reserves in 2011. Peak demand historically occurs about 10 percent of the total hours in a year. By 2011 an additional 71 MW of peaking capacity will be required.

Staff recommendations for meeting these capacity needs are:

• Base load capacity: Lodi Power Plant - (60-75 MW proposed out of 75 MW needed)
  60-75 MW ownership interest in combined cycle gas turbine plant next to City of Lodi Wastewater Treatment Plant and Interstate 5. Partnership with Northern California Power Association, a public power consortium. Cost:  $55-$65 million. Benefits: Extremely efficient operation; opportunity to utilize operations staff from existing power plant; adjacent to existing electric and natural gas transmission.
• Peaking capacity:  Reciprocating Gas Engines (49.2 MW proposed out of 71 MW needed)
  Piston-driven engines fueled by natural gas are commonly used in power plant applications in Europe and on large ocean-going vessels. These pre-packaged units are more expensive initially than conventional gas turbines but faster to build and more economical to operate. Staff recommends six units of 8.2 MW each for a total of 49.2 MW. Cost:  $60-$65 million. Benefits:10 percent more efficient than best simple-cycle gas turbine; fast start-up in seven minutes per unit, all units less than10 minutes; low minimum load per unit of four MW offers operational flexibility. Water-cooled by means of closed-loop system similar to car radiator; does not require costly zero liquid discharge system. Run on line gas pressures; no gas compressor system needed. Housed inside plain industrial building; appearance and noise are not issues.

2008 Budget Workshop

• Electric Resources Division proposal capital budget: $15,488,300
  Several expenditures at Don Pedro Dam and Powerhouse are required by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Two large capital expenditures are new proposals added since last year's 2008 budget forecast, subject to Board approval:
  • $10,150,000 - Reciprocating Power Plant Project - initial phases.
  • $  3,800,000 - Lodi Power Plant Project - initial phases.
• Transmission & Distribution Division proposed capital budget: $33,559,420
  Much of this budget is "routine capital," i.e., the cost of providing overhead and underground electric service to new customers under MID's obligation to serve policy. Routine capital costs include labor, equipment and materials. Other items of note are:
  •  Portions of the Westley-Rosemore 230 kilovolt (kV) Transmission Line Project:
    • $4,000,000 - Construction of the 230 kV transmission line.
    • $4,523,820 - Developing Rosemore Substation into an intertie (transmission-level) substation.
    • $1,091,000 - Replacement/upgrade of 69-kV circuit breakers.
  • $1,000,000 - Land acquisition for planned future electric facilities.
  • $625,000 - Scheduled replacement/restoration of direct-buried underground electrical cable.
  • $620,000 - Construction of Reservoir Substation and associated transmission/distribution lines.
  • $597,500 - Upgrade of the fiber-optic communications network connecting four new substations in the northeast part of MID's service area.
  • $499,000 - 500 new and 2,000 replacement STEP (air conditioner cycling) devices.