Lamar Utilities Board Meeting February 10, 2026

Purchase orders 2025-02731 through 2025-02952 were approved, totaling $732,855.48, of which $720,252.22 needed board approval.  They included $47,645 to Tri County Ford for a new F-150 4WD pickup, $81,809.55 to CIRSA for first quarter property insurance, and $567,580.29 to ARPA for January power purchased.  Payment of $155,809.37 in bills was approved.

Again, due to the Tyler software conversion, there are still no financial reports for August, 2025 through January of 2026.  The board voted to approve  a collateral consent agreement with Sandhills Energy.  Sandhills Energy is the company who will be interconnecting 4.8MW of solar power into our distribution system.  The collateral consent agreement was sent to the four members where the solar is being located (Lamar, La Junta, Las Animas, and Trinidad) and to ARPA.  Basically, the agreement is that if, in the event that Sandhills defaults financially, ARPA and its members acknowledge that Sandhills lender, ALTER DOMUS (US) LLC, will step in and take of operations, the PPA, and the other interconnection agreements made with Clay Creek (Sandhills).  They will be required to perform according to the agreements and uphold all the requirements of those agreements.

In his System Operating Report, Superintendent Hourieh reported:  “Our wind turbine generation data for 2025 showed that Lamar’s two wind turbines have generated 8,235.24 MWH’s of electricity.  This is about 2.31% lower than what was generated in 2024.  The turbines have an average capacity factor of 27.77% which is lower than last year by about 2.65%.  Since we installed the wind turbines in 2003, 2010 was the best year, followed by 2008.  The third best year was 2020.  T-4, ARPAs turbine, generated 4,047.48 MHWs.  The Springfield turbine generated 5,705.91 MWHs of electricity through the same period, with an average capacity factor of 43.44%.  Linear Labs team has been on site with Revive Wind, working on &-2, where they have removed the old pitch system and installed the new Pitch-Pro 2000.  The new system consists of 3 new axis panels (one for each blade), 18 capacitors, and 3 VFDs.  Keba engineers are on site, programming the variable frequency drives;  also, Bachmann Engineers are on site to install and configure the plc’s logic”.

The Lamar Utilities Board meets next on Tuesday, February 24, 2026.

By: Barbara Crimond