Samalayuca II is a 700-MW power plant just south of Ciudad Juarez in the state of Chihuahua,
directly across the border from El Paso, Texas. Construction of the plant was completed in the
autumn of 1998. Samalayuca II was structured as a BLT project because, until December 1992,
build-own-operate (BOO) projects were not permitted under Mexican law. The plant will be
leased for 20 years and then owned by the CFE. It is adjacent to Samalayuca I, a 320-MW plant. (Samalayuca I used both oil and natural gas until the new Samalayuca gas pipeline was completed in early 1998, and is now expected to use mostly gas.) The new plant employs three state-of-the-art GE Frame 7FA gas turbine/steam turbine, combined cycle machines and is equipped with state-of-the-art environmental equipment to meet current Texas air-quality standards. The shortage of water in the area is reflected in the plant’s design. Although the plant was designed to run on natural gas, it is also capable of running on diesel oil.
The plant supplies power not only for Ciudad Juarez, a city of 1 million residents and more than 300 factories, but also for US customers under US-Mexican electricity interchange agreements. The project has brought benefits to the local economy through the local purchase of goods and services, and through the creation, at the plant site, of 1,800 jobs at the peak of construction and 100 permanent jobs.
The 45-mile Samalayuca pipeline carries natural gas from El Paso Energy’s Hueco compressor station, near El Paso, to the Samalayuca site. The US$35 million pipeline project, carried out in 1997, involved the construction of 22 miles of pipeline in the United States and 23miles in Mexico. It is a 50/50 joint venture between two business units of El Paso Energy Corporation El Paso Natural Gas and El Paso Energy International Company and Pemex.