Plug Power targets 2025 plant opening
Plug Power told County Commissioners that it is pushing to complete construction on a hydrogen plant near Graham by late 2025 to meet rising demand for hydrogen fuel. The company already has invested about $13 million in the Project Limestone plant, building a water line and pump station from the City of Graham’s wastewater treatment plant, and pilings for electric lines to run from the Young Wind farm to the hydrogen facility on FM 209.
Graham City Manager Eric Garretty told Commissioners at their May 13 meeting that the water line, which will supply about 300,000 gallons per day to the plant, was 67 percent complete. The City of Graham is acting as contractor for the water line and pump station, he said.
Although the project is at least a year behind schedule, progress on the Graham plant was visible, Mr. Garretty told the Commissioners. Earlier in May, Plug Power received $1.66 billion in loan guarantees from the U.S. Department of Energy, alleviating concerns that the company didn’t have sufficient funding to complete its ambitious plans to build out hydrogen “hubs” across the U.S.
“If you drive down [State Highway] 67 or up [FM] 209 and you see all those crews out there, that’s what they’re doing,” he said. “I think that line will be ready for operational testing … to the water quality they need in October-November.”
Plug Power representative Andrew Temple spoke with the Commissioners Court at a public hearing to discuss amending the County’s tax abatement agreement with the company, which had planned to open the new facility by March 31.
Plug Power’s tax abatement agreement with Young County was set to expire because the energy company did not meet the deadline or a oneyear extension to have the plant substantially completed by March 31.
Of its planned six hydrogen hubs across the country, Project Limestone in Graham will be the largest, producing 45 tons per day, Mr. Temple said.
“This plant will more than double our capacity in the U.S.,” he said. “We know we have the need for it, we know we have the customer demand and we are not at all concerned about selling it. We’re concerned about how fast we can build … the Limestone plant.”
The company has completed the engineering redesigns and anticipates that construction on the plant itself will begin in the third quarter of this year.
Plug Power asked for an extension on the tax abatement period to March 31, 2026 but believes it will complete the plant by the last quarter of 2025, he said. The company began making pilot payments of about $300,000 in January, and asked the Commissioners to backdate the agreement to that date.
The company will make nine more payments over the next ten years, until 2033, Judge Graham said.
The amended agreement “results in a less depreciated asset when it returns to the County tax rolls at full value,” Judge Graham said.
“This new agreement will result in more tax revenues for the county and incentivize the construction, creating a major tax revenue boost for both the Newcastle Independent School District and the Olney Hamilton Hospital.”
The Commissioners unanimously accepted the amended agreement.
In March, Olney voters approved the sale of $33 million in general obligation bonds to fund a new hospital on the understanding that the bonds would be repaid with tax revenue from the Plug Power plant and two wind farms in the hospital’s taxing district.
The hospital sold $27 million in bonds - reserving the final $6 million until the hydrogen plant is substantially complete, OHH officials said. The Newcastle Independent School District also was counting on the hydrogen plant tax revenue to expand its stadium, track and campus.
The Department of Energy Loan Programs Office does not specifically list the Graham plant among the six planned hydrogen facilities, which “affords DOE control over the qualification process of any proposed project” while giving Plug Power “flexibility in developing these projects,” said Marcel Goldstein, Plug Power’s Managing Director, Corporate.
“Currently, however, the loan application and the DOE’s due diligence process is focused on qualifying Plug’s liquid green hydrogen generation plant in Graham, Texas – Project Limestone,” he said in an email to the Enterprise.
“As evidenced by the recent update provided to Young County Commissioner’s Court by Plug representatives on May 13, 2024, Plug is committed to building the Limestone plant to meet upcoming customer needs.”