Great River Energy finalizes contract with Trimont Area Wind Farm

Elk River, Minn. (October 5, 2004)
Great River Energy will begin taking power from Minnesota’s first commercial-scale, landowner-developed wind farm in 2005, following last week’s extension of the Production Tax Credit by Congress. President Bush signed the Working Families Tax Relief Act of 2004 yesterday in Des Moines, Iowa, which includes the extension.

PPM Energy, a unit of ScottishPower (NYSE: SPI), will build the 100-megawatt wind project in southwestern Minnesota. The project is scheduled to begin delivering energy to Great River Energy and its 28 member cooperatives in 2005.

Trimont Area Wind Farm (TAWF), a coalition of landowners in Jackson and Martin counties, won the contract through a request for proposals (RFP) process initiated by Great River Energy in 2003. TAWF was selected because of its competitive price, its access to interconnection facilities and ability to deliver the power to Great River Energy’s member cooperatives. In addition, the location of the project was within the co-op’s service territory and the developer is comprised of local landowners.

Subsequent to its selection by Great River Energy, TAWF chose PPM Energy to develop the project on its behalf. The project owner is Trimont Wind I, LLC (Trimont Wind), a wholly owned affiliate of PPM Energy. PPM Energy, headquartered in Portland, Oregon, is ScottishPower's competitive energy business in the U.S. www.ppmenergy.com

The Trimont Project is an opportunity to bring the expertise of an experienced wind developer and owner of wind generating assets to the project. In addition, TAWF will receive profits from the wind project in exchange for assigning the project assets to Trimont Wind. TAWF members will also receive a development fee and ongoing participation in gross revenues in addition to the traditional lease payments to landowners.

The completion of this project in 2005 will increase the renewable content of Great River Energy’s energy portfolio to approximately 5 percent. The project will meet the energy needs of approximately 29,000 cooperative customers.

Great River Energy is a generation and transmission cooperative providing energy and transmission services to 28 distribution cooperatives in Minnesota and Wisconsin. The second largest utility in Minnesota, Great River Energy serves approximately 580,000 customers or 1.3 million people.

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