TotalEnergies has started commercial operations of Myrtle Solar, its utility-scale operated solar farm in the United States.
Located south of Houston, Texas, Myrtle has a capacity of 380 megawatts peak (MWp) of solar production and 225 MWh of co-located batteries. With 705,000 ground-mounted photovoltaic panels installed over an area equivalent to 1,800 American football fields, Myrtle produces enough green electricity to cover the equivalent consumption of 70,000 homes.
70% of Myrtle’s capacity will supply green electricity to the Company’s industrial plants in the U.S. Gulf Coast region. It is part of the company’s “Go Green” Project, which will enable the company to cover, by 2025, the power needs and curtail the Scope 1+2 emissions of its industrial sites in Port Arthur and La Porte in Texas, and Carville in Louisiana.
The remaining 30% of Myrtle’s capacity will supply green electricity to Kilroy Realty, a publicly traded real estate company, under a 15-year corporate power purchase agreement (CPPA) indexed on merchant prices.
In addition to the photovoltaic installations, the solar power plant also features battery energy storage equipment to meet the need for grid stabilization. With a total capacity of 225 MWh, this storage is made of 114 high-tech Energy Storage Systems (ESS) containers designed and assembled by TotalEnergies‘ affiliate Saft, which develops cutting-edge industrial batteries.
The Myrtle project, which benefits from the IRA (Inflation Reduction Act) Tax Credit mechanisms, will positively contribute to TotalEnergies’ Integrated Power’s profitability target of 12%.