Wright, MN: data center power outlook

Grid position at a glance

Serving utilities

CITY OF BUFFALO - (MN), CITY OF ELK RIVER, CITY OF ST PAUL - (NE), CONNEXUS ENERGY, DELANO MUNICIPAL UTILITIES, MCLEOD COOPERATIVE POWER ASSN, MEEKER COOP LIGHT & POWER ASSN, NORTHERN STATES POWER CO - MINNESOTA, STEARNS COOPERATIVE ELEC ASSN, WRIGHT-HENNEPIN COOP ELEC ASSN

ISO / market

MISO (Midcontinent Independent System Operator)

Highest grid access

400 kV

Substations in county

53

Industrial retail rate

9.3¢/kWhState-level EIA-861 industrial average. The map colours by this, not by a per-county rate.

Per-utility rates in county

6 of 10 serving utilities: 7.9 to 11.8¢/kWhLowest to highest industrial rate among the utilities serving this county (EIA-861 Sales to Ultimate Customers). A spread, not the county’s rate, and it covers only the serving utilities that report one.

Interconnection queue

2 projects, 250 MW

Proposed generation

None on file (EIA-860M)Units filed with EIA as planned or under construction (Form EIA-860M). Declared intent from the federal inventory, not the interconnection queue and not guaranteed capacity.

Grid carbon intensity

982 lb CO2/MWh

Water withdrawals

329 Mgal/dAll uses, freshwater. Water already withdrawn locally, not water available for a new load.

Construction labor near site

110,800 employed in construction within ~120 kmA large build needs hundreds of skilled construction workers on site for one to three years. A county with few of them within commuting range means bussing crews in, per diem, and housing, which is real cost and schedule risk. This counts people employed in construction within about a 120 km drive (BLS QCEW), summed across nearby counties. It is not labor known to be available: most are already committed to other projects, and no public data reveals who is free.

Grid conditions in Wright

Everything here about Wright, Minnesota comes from public federal and state records, with the gaps left visible. Wright reaches 400 kV, a high-voltage transmission class, at its strongest mapped point of grid access. With 53 substations mapped, Wright offers interconnection points across many locations.

Wright falls inside the MISO market (Midcontinent Independent System Operator), which governs how its interconnection requests and capacity move. The rate for Wright is the 9.3 cents per kWh state industrial average (EIA-861), the same figure the map colours by. Across Wright, reported per-utility industrial rates cover 6 of 10 serving utilities: 7.9 to 11.8¢/kWh, offered only as context beneath the state figure.

Wright has 2 interconnection-queue projects on record, totalling 250 MW of requested capacity. Nothing is on file for Wright, Minnesota in EIA-860M as planned or under construction, which counts as a measured zero. The balancing authority covering Wright carries a grid carbon intensity of 981.982 lb CO2 per MWh in eGRID.

Reported freshwater withdrawals for all uses in Wright are 329.18 million gallons per day in the USGS 2015 compilation, existing demand rather than water free for a new load. Around Wright, some 110,800 people work in construction within about a 120 km commute (BLS QCEW), a measure of reach, not of available crews.

These numbers for Wright are screening-grade context for the whole county, drawn from public data with the gaps left visible. Read the figures for Wright, Minnesota together rather than one at a time: grid access matters less without substations near it, and a quiet queue reads differently inside an organized market than outside one. The next step for Wright, Minnesota is an address-level interconnection study; the county figures here only narrow where to look. For Wright, Minnesota, the source log below records where each figure comes from and when it was pulled, keeping the provenance visible.

Sources