Allegheny Energy Headquarters Rising on Schedule
The energy company's new transmission headquarters is being built at the 1-79 Technology Park in Fairmont.
The State Journal
By Pam Kasey
September 17, 2009
http://www.statejournal.com/story.cfm?func=viewstory&storyid=66721
FAIRMONT -- Allegheny Energy is making progress on a new transmission headquarters in Fairmont as construction on its Trans-Allegheny Interstate Line gets under way.
“They’ve got most of the facilities that go underground in place, and the steel is being put in the air,” said Allegheny Vice President for Transmission Jim Haney of the 148,000-square-foot building going up at I-79 Technology Park.
“The building will be one story underground and four stories above ground and you can see all four stories at this point,” Haney said. “The plan is to have it under roof by the end of the year.”
About 50 people are working on the project. Omni Associates architects of Fairmont designed the building and March Westin of Morgantown is the general contractor.
The transmission headquarters was part of Allegheny Energy’s settlement with the Public Service Commission of West Virginia, one of a number of concessions the utility provided in return for PSC staff dropping its contention that the need for the Trans-Allegheny Interstate Line had not been demonstrated.
The building’s 150 employees will provide engineering and other technical support services for the company’s 4,000 miles of high-voltage transmission and 4,000 miles of subtransmission.
“Picture in your mind what mission control looks like at NASA,” said Allegheny Corporate Communications Manager Allen Staggers. “Imagine people in a large control room with lots of computer interfaces.”
Fairmont transmission staff will conduct real-time monitoring of the network using those computers and, in addition, will plan, engineer and design all of the maintenance, upgrades and new construction for the network.
The transmission network currently is managed out of Greensburg, Pa., Haney said.
But the company already was planning to build a new building, and Fairmont should work out well, Haney said — both because its proximity to West Virginia University and Fairmont State University makes for good hiring and because I-79 Technology Park provides good communications infrastructure.
One-hundred to 115 Greensburg employees will be offered the opportunity to transfer, Haney said. The company also is hiring a small number of technical staff now and over time to be trained and work in temporary facilities in Fairmont, and final staffing needs will be more clear in late 2010.Meanwhile, construction has begun on the 500-kilovolt Trans-Allegheny Interstate Line that will run from a new substation in Pennsylvania south through Monongalia County, across Marion, Taylor, Preston, Tucker, Grant, Hardy and Hampshire counties and into Virginia — about 150 miles in total.
The first 80 towers are under construction to the east of Mount Storm in Grant County, where the route parallels existing lines, Haney said.
About 1,100 workers are employed so far on construction, engineering, surveying, road building and other aspects of the line. Kenny Construction of Northbrook, Ill. is the general contractor.
Construction will begin in late fall west of Mount Storm, most of that in a new transmission corridor.
Not all of the needed rights of way have been secured, Haney said.
“We’re expecting it to be in the neighborhood of 5 percent of the property owners” who don’t come to agreement over right of way, he said.
“If we can’t reach agreement, then we file with the local court for eminent domain proceedings to begin.”
In that case, the courts decide what the property owners are entitled to.
Haney said he expects occupancy to begin at the transmission headquarters in fall 2010, with full completion of construction in late 2010.
The TrAIL line is expected to be in service in June 2011.
