abbreviation key · 2014-08-08 · the project, which touts nrg solar, google and brightsource as...

The UniTed AssociATion | UNION PLUMBERS, PIPEFITTERS, SPRINKLERFITTERS, STEAMFITTERS AND SERVICE TECHS10

Abbreviation Key:VP Vice PresidentIR International RepresentativeBM Business ManagerGF General Foreman

St StewardJ JourneymanAp ApprenticeVIP Veterans In Piping program

UA Journal May_June_2013PRESS:UA Journal Aug 5/29/13 10:46 AM 0

| MAY/JUNE 2013journal 11

it’s

The Ivanpah Solar Field—Concentratingthe Sun’s Energy

sunrise in the Mojave Desert, approximately 50 miles northwest of Needles, California, (about five milesfrom the California-Nevada border) on federal land managed by the Bureau of Land Management, as we drivepast fields of flattened heliostats. As the sun rises, the heliostats—which are mirrors, not solar panels—will tilt backand swivel to track the sun and concentrate sunlight onto a boiler filled with water that sits atop a tower. Whenthe sunlight hits the boiler, the water inside is heated to create high-temperature steam, which is used in a conventional steam turbine generator to produce electricity. BrightSource Energy’s LPT solar thermal system isso impressive, and it has been deployed to make up the 377 mega watt net Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System.

Steve Boise (J, Local 250), Bob Lamb (IR), John Piatti (J, Local 403), Sid Stolper (UA VP District 5 and BM District Council 16), Bob Regalado

(Bechtel Labor Relations), Gene Glover (St), Richard Edwards (BM), Bob May (Deputy Site Manager, Bechtel)

UA Journal May_June_2013PRESS:UA Journal Aug 5/29/13 10:46 AM Page 11


The project, which touts NRG Solar,Google and BrightSource as equity in-vestors (referred to as Solar Partners),is currently the largest solar plant underconstruction in the world. Ivanpahstarted construction in October 2010,and in 2013 it will deliver peak powerto 140,000 homes to serve the com-pany’s signed contracts with PG&E andSouthern California Edison. Employedby Bechtel, UA journeymen and ap-prentices have made up the majority ofthe workforce, and they have become acritical component to the success ofthis project. Manning this project was a

colossal challenge. Overall craft man-power peaked at 2,200, manning a dayand night shift rotation; 687 were UApiping professionals from DistrictCouncil 16 in California and beyond. Itwas noted that the Ivanpah projectwould generate approximately $650million in wages and employee earn-ings over the facility’s first 30 years ofoperation.

Richard Edwards, Business Managerfrom Plumbers and Pipefitters Local364, Colton, California, stated, “Thisjob just didn’t happen. We partneredwith the IBEW and CURE throughoutCalifornia. All of these projects havebeen CURE projects.” District Council16 Business Manager and UA VicePresident of District 5 Sid Stolperadded, “CURE is a coalition of unionswhose members’ mission is to helpsolve the state’s energy challenges bybuilding, maintaining and operatingconventional and renewable energypower plants. The UA workforce we

Jim Kinley (J)

Carlos Nolan (J), Byron Travillion (J, Local 250)

Francisco Larios (J), Rick Graham (J)

Stuart Swick II (J)

Keith Spann (Ap)

Aaron Howland (J, Local 398)

Jeremy Mercer (J), Craig Kent (J)


13| MAY/JUNE 2013journal

Joseph Ramirez Jr. (J, Local 114)

Damon James (J), Jeffrey Greer (J)

have brought on to these projects hasperformed above and beyond. This hasenabled us to do projects like this. It hasbeen an unquestioned success. Every-where I go, owners and contractors areraving. I always get thanked for thequality the UA provides. This particularproject is a great example of this initia-tive and of the UA tripartite approach.”

Brother Edwards continued, “Aspartners, the UA, Bechtel, and SolarPartners were all on board. There was alot of communication and cooperationfrom all of us to move this project for-ward. We utilized our Standard for Ex-

cellence program successfully, we hiredlocally, and we reiterated that we workin partnership with our contractors.There was a lot of pre-job planning that involved the Bureau of Land Man-agement. This is a very environmen-tally friendly project. Great care wastaken to ensure the protection of thedesert tortoise, as well as protecting na-tive vegetation (see side article). To that end, it took about two-and-a-halfyears to get the project started, andthen we had to man up. Manpowerparticipation involved just about everylocal in District Council 16. We pulled

a lot of craftsmen from our sisterlocals in California. We pulled fromLas Vegas, Local 525. Their work hadslowed down, and this project came up, which was a great thing. Our localhas a lot of work going on right now—five power plants to be exact—so wedefinitely needed the support from oursister locals to man this project.”

The solar field consists of three 459-foot towers built on 3,500 acres. Thetowers are roughly two miles apart, although once onsite the distance is deceiving, and the towers appear muchcloser. Surrounding the towers,

Dalton Hebert (J,Local 198)

Dave Pritchard (J), Wayne Williams (J), Jonathan Jaynes (Ap)

Richard Kimble (J)


referred to as Units 1, 2 and 3, the he-liostats fan out. There will be 60,000heliostats surrounding Units 2 and 3,and 53,500 heliostats surrounding Unit1 when all Units are completed. Theheliostats are assembled in a buildingonsite. They are transported to thefield with a tractor to stage them. Ivan-pah currently has nine cranes settingheliostats. Due to the winds beingcalmer at night, a night crew has beenadded to expedite installation. To in-stall the heliostats, pre-drilling is donewith augers, in essence “punching” thebase into the ground through vibra-tion, leaving behind a tiny pile of dirt.This low-impact process allows the he-liostats in the field to correspond to thearea’s natural contours and eliminatesthe need for foundations and concretepads in the field. Upon completion in2013, there will be a total of 113,500software-controlled heliostats to reflectthe sun’s light onto the “solar receiversteam generators” (SRSGs) or boilerssitting atop the three towers. The SRSGs are located on the top of

the towers. Concentrated sunlight hitsthe panel or water wall and flowsthrough it, heating the boiler’s pipes toover 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit, whichproduces super-heated steam, and atthat instant—the tower becomes apower plant. Steam is then piped fromthe boiler to a standard steam turbinegenerator, which is located at the bot-tom of the towers where electricity isproduced. BrightSource’s technology isextremely efficient at producing highertemperature and pressure steam, which

allows Bright-Source’s systemto transformsolar energyinto a dispatch-able and cost-competitive resource. A gas

pipeline sup-ports an auxil-iary boiler thatallows a rapidheat-up of theboilers in the morning, expediting thestartup of the plant in the morning.The process is fairly simple and hasbeen described as an inside-out boiler.There is a lot of pipe in this Bechtel-de-signed system—54,000 linear feet (lf)of large-bore pipe, 48,000 lf of small-bore pipe, and 75,500 lf of undergroundpipe that the UA was responsible for.The UA has also been responsible forthe Riley Boiler piping. Floors nine andup contain pipe with an average lengthof six feet. When you look at the boiler,tubes are visible on the outside. Typi-cally they would be on the inside. AtIvanpah, it is backwards, which madethis project unique. Once up and running, transmission

lines will carry a total of 377 megawattsnet of power to Californian homes andbusinesses. Ivanpah will be celebrated asit draws its fuel from the sun, instead ofusing conventional fossil fuels to createsteam to turn the turbines. The resultwill reduce carbon dioxide emissions bymore than 400,000 tons per year.

International Representative BobLamb added, “By integrating conven-tional power block components, suchas turbines, with BrightSource’s state-of-the-art proprietary technology andsolar field design, electric power plantsusing its systems can deliver cost-com-petitive, reliable, and clean power whenneeded the most.”The transmission lines are coming

from the Hoover Dam. Old lines arebeing pulled down, and new ones arebeing erected. Bechtel was involved inthe original construction of the HooverDam as part of the team referred to as


Ryan Michaelis (Ap), RobSentieri (J, Local 398)

Jose Arredondo (J), David Stein (J), Hugh Brown (J)

AnthonyAbreo(Ap)


Six Companies Incorporated. This up-graded line now connects generationsof technology together—the HooverDam and the Ivanpah Solar Project.All three units (towers) are moni-

tored from one building. There are twomirrors to a heliostat, and the he-liostats are constantly being adjusted toensure that they make the most of thesun’s energy. Aboveground cablescrisscross each solar field. The technol-ogy for each heliostat is enclosed in acontrol box housed on each heliostat.Sensors monitor the heliostats’ posi-tions. If the wind kicks up to a pre-de-

termined speed, the heliostats will au-tomatically lay flat. Weather stationsare a critical part of these solar fields. Maintaining the heliostats involves

keeping the mirrors clean of debris.Mirror washing machines will be deployed to clean the mirrors regu-larly. The water is recycled from eachunit, which minimizes water wasteand pollution. At the time of our tour in February,

Unit 1 was in start-up mode and hadalready generated steam. Unit 2 was93 percent complete, and Unit 3 was87 percent complete. It is anticipated

that the field will be turned over to thegrid in a phased-in approach startingwith Unit 1 in November, followed bythe other units’ phasing-in withineight-week increments. By May, theoperation will be doing steam blows,and the manpower will be down toroughly 100 people.Bob Regalado, Labor Relations,

Bechtel, stated, “The UA played a largerole in this project given the unique-ness of the project. We will be produc-ing power here soon, and that lends toall of the crafts’ credit, pipefitters inparticular. We have a strong partner-


RobinEllis (J,Local230)

John Righetti (J, Local 228) Jaime Vazquez (Ap)Tom Pegenau (J, Local 111)

Eric Arceneaux (J, Local 525)

Marcel Fortin (J)

Sharon Tweet (J)



ship with Local 364 and District Coun-cil 16. We had to staff up rapidly. Theyworked with us in a very expeditiousway to make sure we had plenty of ca-pable welders. We have had strongleadership in Foreman and GeneralForeman, and our lead General Fore-man, in particular, helped pull it all to-gether for us. Bechtel has a lot of itsleadership who have come from thetrades. These are people who knowpipefitting firsthand. We like to havethem on hand, so that they can lead inan appropriate way. The success of thisproject will provide an opportunity tobuild a lot more like it.”Bob May, Deputy Site Manager for

Bechtel and former Pipefitters Local449, Pittsburgh, PA, member, has beenon the road for Bechtel for 24 years. Hestated, “The job is going very well. It isabout 93 percent complete. The UA wasabout 30 percent of the entire workforcehere. We still have 360 pipefitters onsite.They are doing a very, very good job.The quality is excellent. We have hadthree boiler hydros with zero leaks—that is almost unheard of in the indus-try. I’ve been doing this a long time—38years—and I don’t know if I have beenon a project with three boiler hydroswith zero leaks. It’s very impressive, andwe take a lot of pride in that. Safety andquality—we all agree they are numberone and two. We have worked six mil-lion manhours without a reportable in-cident. That is incredible. “The large piping from the air-cooled

condenser was assigned to the pipefit-ters. It is not traditional piping that pip-efitters do (it was originally assigned to

the boilermakers through the agree-ment). It is not seam piping. It is built insegments. They had to learn this tech-nology. They picked it up on Unit 2 andthen came in and did Unit 3. The UAhas always been great at adjusting to required skill sets. The local found theguys who have done this work in thepast and brought them in. They, in turn,mentored the others with their expert-ise. That showed flexibility. Once theUA is assigned work, they train andwork hard to perfect it. The UA trainingprogram plays a huge role in UA jour-neymen and apprentices’ capabilities.Whenever you have truly skilled crafts-men coming out of an organized train-ing program, they become invaluable.”Senior Pipefitter General Foreman

Scott Jahnke has been out here for 27months. He is a 36-year member ofLocal 364. “This is the largest commer-cial solar plant in the world,” saidBrother Jahnke. “With California’smandate for renewable energy, it isopening the door for everyone outhere. It is a flagship job; we have a lotof craftsmen from all over NorthAmerica who really want to be in-volved with this new technology.Working here will offer them somevaluable experience. Our guys areworking on 400-foot-plus towers, oninside-out boilers. It is like a verticalpipe rack, not a horizontal pipe rack. Itis a challenging job. There is nothingelse like it. It takes skilled professionalsto install the pipe and weld it to makeit work. The UA’s training gives themthe academic and hands-on training,the skill level and experience you can’t

UA Bechtel team at Ivanpah Solar Generating Plant

Joe Robertson (J)

RobertRea (J,Local 114)

Jeff Cooper (Ap)



Bechtel Team working on Unit 3

David Sinclair (J, Local 494)

Gene Glover (St), Scott Jahnke (GF and President Local 364), Richard Edwards (BM),David Kirk (VP Local 364)

Jason Brosius (J)Bob Lamb (IR), Kyle McMahon (Local 364 VIP apprentice),Sid Stolper (VP District 5, BM District Council 16)

Eugene DeLaGarza (J), Delano Paul Martin (J, Local 230), Manuel Olivas (J)



get anywhere else. There is still a needfor what we produce out here. Bechtel ishappy with us. We have provided thebest manpower. The hiring hall hasbeen a network to get the best weldersout here. It is always challenging to pullguys from all over. Everyone has a dif-ferent skill set, but we have successfullycombed through and have sent the bestguys to the job. Pipe is pipe. We learnand adapt. We build things. I am veryproud to be out here.”Bechtel representatives have been

forthcoming in commending the UA’sleadership. In addition to BrotherJahnke, Gene Glover, Steward, has beenon the Ivanpah job for two years. Hestated, “I’ve been working on the rerunfuel gas line for the auxiliary boiler fromthe tie-in to the common area to Unit 1.Lines will go to each unit to power off of natural gas. I also worked at AccionaEnergy’s Nevada Solar One where theybuilt the original plant with parabolictrough technology. I will be out hereuntil the end. I’ve been in the industryfor 35 years. Business Manager RichardEdwards, Scott, and myself all started on

Nick Karaica (J) Rafael Escobedo (J, Local 484)

Drake Ward(J, Local 250)

Andres Melgoza(J, Local 398)

John Brock (J, Local 230)

Patrick O’Neil (J, Local 525)

Orrin Krause (J, Loca

l 761)Bryan Huf

ford (J, Local 114)

Richard Flores (J), Sid Stolper (UA VPDistrict 5 and BM District Council 16)



Rickey Richardson(J, Local 452)

Homer Anderson (J)

The Gift of StewardshipIvanpah project has taken a proactive approach to protecting the threat-

ened desert tortoise by building a head start facility and employing experiencedbiologists to complete research. It is estimated that the Ivanpah project owners,known as Solar Partners (NRG, Google and BrightSource) have spent $22 millioncaring for and translocating the elusive desert tortoise. Originally it was thoughtthat there were not a lot of tortoises in the area where the state-of-the-art solarthermal project was planned. More tortoises were found than original estimatesindicated would be in the area. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) reiniti-ated consultation with Solar Partners to produce a new biological opinion, whilestate and federal agencies devised a plan that everyone agreed on.

Since its inception, the Ivanpah tortoise translocation and head start programhas been a godsend for biologists who have been given the unique opportunityto study the threatened species. They have painstakingly kept records of eachand every tortoise. Their efforts have been commendable, and quite frankly, theextent to which Solar Partners is helping to facilitate the rebuilding of the deserttortoise population in the Ivanpah Valley area is admirable. So far this spring, 57tortoises have been moved back into their home range in the Ivanpah Valley.The biologists have been watchful that each tortoise’s translocation will remainwell within its home range in a habitat that has familiar soil composition, foodsources, weather and terrain. There is a set protocol that must be adhered to forthe release of each tortoise. Each tortoise’s health is assessed to ensure it ishealthy, and they must be fully hydrated. Biologists are scheduled to monitoreach tortoise every day for a week to ensure the tortoise is properly acclimatingto its new surroundings. They will then check on them once a week during theiractive season and then twice a month during the winter season when the tortoises are safely in their burrows.

In the wild, the desert tortoise has many predators, and only about two per-cent of desert tortoises survive to adulthood (reproductive age). Ivanpah’s headstart program has, no doubt, given a boost to the juvenile tortoise population.Hatchling and juvenile tortoises are released once they reach a larger size, making survival more likely when translocated into the Ivanpah Valley.

California’s goal of generating a third of its power from renewable sources by2020 will only be a success story if these projects can be built. Biologists aredoing all that they can to ensure the safe translocation of the desert tortoise.The plight of the desert tortoise involves so many factors. Solar Partners is goingto great lengths to ensure minimal impact to the desert tortoise population atand near the Ivanpah project site. In the end, the information gathered at theIvanpah project will help the desert tortoise community learn more about thespecies, which will provide valuable information that will help the species onceagain flourish. The goal in five years—for everyone involved—is for the biologiststo walk away leaving behind a viable desert tortoise population.

the same job. This project has been veryrewarding.”International Representative Bob

Lamb summed it up best, stating, “Thisis a green-energy project. PresidentObama has put this on his agenda as acritical part of America’s future energyplan. I really want the UA to be involvedin all types of energy. This is somethingthat will keep our pensions and health-care funded. As long as we do the jobright the first time, we will have a future.We are good at what we do. That is afact. We build things correctly and move on.” The success of Ivanpah will help

to lead the way for other utility-scalesolar thermal projects. The high solarradiation of the Mojave Desert is wellsuited for these types of projects. Amer-ica’s energy portfolio must portray andutilize all types of energy. This will allowus to reduce our carbon footprint, whilebenefiting the economy and producingmuch-needed energy well into the fu-ture. Powering green technology is aconcept that all Americans can agree on.

The


abbreviation key · 2014-08-08 · the project, which touts nrg solar, google and brightsource as...

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