一个跨越五平方英里的大型太阳能项目正在加利福尼亚州棕榈泉附近的沙漠建造。一旦完成，450兆瓦的Athos I和Athos II太阳能设施将覆盖3,000多英亩，并产生超过2,200 GWH每年的可再生能源，足以为179,000户家庭供电。

The division of electrical contractor Rosendin was contracted by subsidiaries of SB Energy US Holdings One Inc., a renewable energy company and a subsidiary of SoftBank Group Corp., to design and build the $700-million project. SB Energy says the facility is being built to help meet California’s Renewable Portfolio Standard to advance renewable energy.

The 200-MW Athos 2 is currently about 98% complete and set to operate in December, and the 250-MW Athos 1 is more than 50% complete with an operation date in April 2022.

Rosendin Renewable Energy Group高级副总裁David Lincoln说：“有50英里以上的道路贯穿该物业，完成该项目所需的人员和资源数量非常大。”“能够在沙漠中间将300至400个电气交易员聚集在一起，并在同一页面上并有动力完成该项目的时间确实令人印象深刻

该地点在加利福尼亚沙漠的一个偏远地区占地3400英亩。
图片由Rosendin提供

对于Athos 1，SB Energy签订了一项电力购买协议，可以销售为Direct Energy Business创造的能源，这是Direct Energy，这是北美最大的能源和能源相关的服务提供商之一，以及Centrica Plc的子公司。对于Athos II，SB Energy将出售长期可再生能源信用额和产出，向位于芝加哥的能源提供商Exelon Corp.

The project has not been without challenges. The solar farm is being constructed in the middle of the desert with remote project access and a 3,400-acre jobsite divided between four different agencies with myriad permitting requirements.

林肯说：“在土地管理局（BLM），河滨县，印度社区和加尔特兰人之间的工作一直在挑战。”“我们必须让这些高度监管的机构在大流行期间在许多办公室关闭时与设计时都同意该设计。”

Each of these four entities enforced its own jurisdiction, and every work area had to be carefully surveyed and mapped before construction crews could go in, says Rick Gonzales, Rosendin division manager at the Athos site.

“有一天，我们将在河滨县的道路上工作，第二天我们将与BLM打交道和其他管辖区，然后部落会来看看是否在其土地上发现了任何（文物），”冈萨雷斯说。“我们在每个司法管辖区都有地役权，但是如果我们走出界限，他们会罚款我们，这使它变得非常困难。”

Temperatures in the desert rose to about 120° F.
图片由Rosendin提供

冈萨雷斯说，河滨县需要81个不同的ATHOS项目许可证，例如光伏阵列，变电站，传输线，操作和维护建筑物以及临时办公拖车。

“The temporary power permit for the temporary site office trailer was the most challenging one,” he says. “It took over six months to get this permit, for a project that is 13 months long. We had to run a very large diesel generator until the utility connection.”

He says there were multiple reasons why it took the county so long to issue permits, including a new computer system, COVID-19, the retirement of key county employees and changing contractor deliverables. “I’ve been on solar projects that require one permit, and 10 or 12 might be a normal amount, but this was the most I’ve seen,” he says.

Besides dozens of permits, the project also requires a massive amount of infrastructure and labor. Rosendin is using union contractors and more than 400 employees, many who are member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), to construct the project. At its busiest, the jobsite has seen 600 workers on site per day.

Athos 1和2包含148万个太阳系列光伏模块；18,715 Nextracker Horizo​​n单轴跟踪器；227,925基础码头，用于追踪器；7.3英里的230 kV传输线；三个变电站；和一个共享的切换场。

Gonzales says the overall complexity of the Athos I and II project led the Rosendin team to embrace the integrated project delivery (IPD) method. He says by involving all stakeholders in the permitting process and all facets of subcontracting and supply chain issues, the team has established a level of accountability and ownership responsibilities required to make this project a “huge success.”

林肯说，当团队于2020年1月开始该项目时，罗森丁将召集自己的内部工程师，客户和主要分包商，并集体从事设计和项目成本。18luck.cub

“The IPD process is a little longer upfront, but you get a more detailed and thorough set of documents to build from and your time frame is shortened significantly,” says Lincoln. “Wwith this IPD approach, there are very few, if any, change orders because all parties are involved in the design process and costing structure, so it’s been a great tool on the project.”

The team brought in an ice cream truck to help cool off crews.
图片由Rosendin提供

沙漠拆除

Granite Industrial Inc. was contracted by Rosendin to perform all site demolition and clearing, site access road construction for 55 miles of access roads, site grading, survey for all post locations and installation of the nearly 230,000 foundation posts for the trackers

Tim Burhoe, director of preconstruction for Granite, says his teams are using a fleet of Vermeer PD10 pile drivers specifically designed for solar use to install the roughly 12-ft-long piles about 7 ft into the ground. He says two-person crews work each machine and can install an average of 5,000 posts per week for Athos I.

“This is a challenging process because we have to survey every point so we can put a giant nail with a ribbon on it that determines which pile goes at each location,” Burhoe says.

Located about 75 miles east of Palm Springs near the small town of Desert Center, the project site is remote and hot. To make it through 120°F summer days, Gonzales says crews started work at 5 a.m. and could leave early if they felt ill or too hot. He says the team set up cool-down stations with ice and shade, arranged water breaks every hour and had safety personnel on site to make sure no one was overheating. Rosendin even brought in an ice cream truck to serve the site.

While hot for humans, the site is perfect for animals such as the desert tortoise and kit fox. To keep them away while infrastructure work was in progress, C&W Construction Specialties Inc. was contracted by SB Energy in 2020 to secure the site by installing about 35 miles of temporary desert tortoise and kit fox exclusion fencing and 28 temporary desert tortoise crossing guards.

That work was completed in late 2020, at which time Rosendin took over construction and contracted C&W to install an additional 35 miles of permanent 6-ft chain fencing and 28 entrance gates as well as fencing and gates for three onsite substations required for the project.

C＆W Construction的高级项目经理兼负责人Eric Marksberry说：“由于C＆W是现场的第一位承包商，因此最大的挑战之一就是能够确保该地点保护该地区的许多不同的野生动植物物种。”专业公司“在庞大的地点旅行也很困难，因为尚未建立道路，并且需要四轮驱动车辆和设备才能进行任何涉及在主高速公路上旅行的任务。由于Athos站点的遥远性以及它们在未开发的地区的事实，因此在逻辑上也有挑战性的材料，设施和设备。”

The team also had to manage unusual items found on the site, including demolishing 30 large concrete aquaculture ponds, removing a couple of unexploded ordnance left from when the site was a World War II training base, which required a bomb squad to remove a date palm farm with roughly 100,000 trees.