The Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) is a nonprofit public utility created in November 1934 by the

Texas Legislature The Texas Legislature is the state legislature of the US state of Texas. It is a bicameral body composed of a 31-member Senate and a 150-member House of Representatives. The state legislature meets at the Capitol in Austin. It is a powerful ar ...

. LCRA's mission is to enhance the lives of the Texans it serves through water stewardship, energy and community service. LCRA provides public power, manages the lower

Colorado River The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. s ...

, builds and operates transmission lines, owns public parks, and offers community services. LCRA does not receive state appropriations or have the ability to levy taxes. Instead, LCRA is funded by revenue it generates, the vast majority of which comes from producing and transmitting electricity. A very small portion of LCRA's revenue comes from selling water.

Power generation portfolio

Coal

The

Fayette Power Project The Fayette Power Project, also known as Sam Seymour Power Plant, is a coal-fired power plant located near La Grange, Texas in Fayette County, Texas. It is owned by Austin Energy and the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) and operated by LCRA ...

is a three-unit coal-fired power plant in Fayette County that provides 1,625

megawatts The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James Wat ...

(MW). ( Austin Energy co-owns two of the units and the power they produce.) Lake Fayette is the cooling pond for the project. LCRA uses

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

from the

Powder River Basin The Powder River Basin is a geologic structural basin in southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming, about east to west and north to south, known for its extensive coal reserves. The former hunting grounds of the Oglala Lakota, the area is very s ...

Wyoming Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to the s ...

as fuel.

Natural gas

The Sim Gideon Power Plant is a three-unit

natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...

-fired plant in Bastrop County that provides 608

. The Lost Pines 1 Power Project (owned and operated by GenTex Power Corporation, an LCRA affiliate) is a

-fired

combined-cycle A combined cycle power plant is an assembly of heat engines that work in tandem from the same source of heat, converting it into mechanical energy. On land, when used to make electricity the most common type is called a combined cycle gas turb ...

plant adjacent to the Sim Gideon plant, and the two form the Lost Pines Power Park. The Lost Pines 1 Power Project can generate up to 511 megawatts. Lake Bastrop is the cooling pond for the Lost Pines Power Park. LCRA broke ground on a new Thomas C. Ferguson Power Plant in April 2012, about 100 yards from the site of the original Ferguson plant on Lake LBJ. The plant began operating in 2014. The old plant was decommissioned. The Ferguson facility is a natural gas-fired, combined cycle plant in Horseshoe Bay capable of producing 540 megawatts. Ferguson is among the most environmentally responsible power plants in Texas, producing 30 to 40 percent fewer emissions per unit of power that the unit it replaced. It uses about 35 percent less fuel per megawatt-hour and about one-third of the water used at a typical steam plant per unit of power. The Winchester Power Park in Fayette County provides about 176 megawatts for use primarily during peak-demand periods. The LCRA buys natural gas on the open market and stores it at the Hilbig Gas Storage Facility, an underground reservoir near Rockne, Texas. The facility can hold up to 4 billion cubic feet of natural gas.

Hydroelectric

LCRA operates six hydroelectric

dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use ...

s along the Colorado River in Central Texas that provide a source of renewable energy and form six lakes collectively known as the Texas Highland Lakes: *

Buchanan Dam The Buchanan Dam () is a multiple arch dam located on the Colorado River of Texas. The dam forms Lake Buchanan and was the first dam to be completed in the chain of Texas Highland Lakes. The dam is used for generating hydroelectric power and ...

(54.9 MW) - forms Lake Buchanan * Inks Dam (13.8 MW) - forms Inks Lake * Wirtz Dam (60 MW) - forms Lake LBJ, which also serves as a cooling pond for the Thomas C. Ferguson Power Plant * Max Starcke Dam (41.4 MW) - forms

Lake Marble Falls Lake Marble Falls is a reservoir on the Colorado River in the Texas Hill Country in the United States. The reservoir was formed in 1951 by the construction of Max Starcke Dam by the Lower Colorado River Authority. Originally named Marble Falls Da ...

* Mansfield Dam (108 MW) - forms

Lake Travis Lake Travis is a reservoir on the Colorado River in central Texas in the United States. Serving principally as a flood-control reservoir, Lake Travis' historical minimum to maximum water height change is nearly 100 feet. In 2018 alone, it saw ...

* Tom Miller Dam (17 MW) - forms

Lake Austin Lake Austin, formerly Lake McDonald, is a water reservoir on the Colorado River in Austin, Texas. The reservoir was formed in 1939 by the construction of Tom Miller Dam by the Lower Colorado River Authority. Lake Austin is one of the seven Hi ...

In keeping with its state-approved Water Management Plan, LCRA generates electricity from the dams only as it releases water for other reasons, or when ordered to do so by the

Electric Reliability Council of Texas The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, Inc. (ERCOT) is an American organization that operates Texas's electrical grid, the Texas Interconnection, which supplies power to more than 25 million Texas customers and represents 90 percent of the s ...

(ERCOT).

Wind

LCRA purchases 51 megawatts of wind power capacity from the Indian Mesa Wind Energy Center in West Texas and 200 megawatts from the Papalote Creek II Wind Farm near the Texas Gulf Coast.

Transmission

LCRA distributes electricity to its wholesale electric customers - mostly municipal utilities and electric cooperatives - and supports the statewide electric transmission network through more than 5,100 miles of

transmission lines In electrical engineering, a transmission line is a specialized cable or other structure designed to conduct electromagnetic waves in a contained manner. The term applies when the conductors are long enough that the wave nature of the transmis ...

and more than 380 substations, which are owned by LCRA Transmission Services Corporation, a nonprofit corporation owned by LCRA.

Water

LCRA manages the Highland Lakes and the lower Colorado River, a 600 mi stretch of the Texas Colorado River, as a system to supply water for more than 1 million people as well as businesses, industries, the environment and agriculture in the lower Colorado River basin. LCRA has the rights to more than 2.1 million acre-feet of water per year based mostly on surface water permits issued by the state of Texas.

Parks and community services

LCRA owns more than 40 public parks, recreation areas and river access sites along the Highland Lakes and lower Colorado River. LCRA's McKinney Roughs and Matagorda Bay nature parks have natural science centers that offer outdoor educational and recreational programs for youths and adults. LCRA offers a wide range of conservation programs for water users within its river basin. It also operates an environmental laboratory, monitors the water quality of the lower Colorado River, and regulates on-site sewage systems to limit pollution and help protect the health of those enjoying the Highland Lakes. LCRA's community services programs include the Community Development Partnership Program, which has awarded almost $42 million in matching grants for 1,491 community development projects since 1995.

History

In November 1934, the Texas Legislature authorized the formation of the Lower Colorado River Authority to complete Buchanan Dam, where construction had been idled in 1932 following the financial collapse and bankruptcy of the Samuel Insull-controlled

public utility A public utility company (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and r ...

holding company A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own shares of other companies ...

. LCRA began operations in February 1935. LCRA completed Buchanan Dam and a companion project, Inks Dam, in 1938—the first of six dams that form the reservoirs known as the Highland Lakes. LCRA completed the chain of lakes and dams in 1951. LCRA manages the chain to protect basin residents from the worst effects of Hill Country floods and provide the lower Colorado River basin with a reliable water supply. With the encouragement of congressman,

Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...

, LCRA used the hydroelectric power from its dams in 1936 to launch a public power program that served communities and electric cooperatives in Central and South Texas. For nearly three decades, hydroelectric generation was LCRA's primary power source. Growing demand for electricity led LCRA to build natural gas and coal-fired power plants. LCRA added to its generation portfolio with the Sim Gideon Power Plant and original Thomas C. Ferguson Power Plant in the 1960s and 1970s, the

in the 1970s and 1980s, the Lost Pines 1 Power Project in 2001 and the Winchester Power Project in 2010. In 1995, LCRA became the first electric utility in Texas to provide wind-generated electricity to its customers from the Texas Wind Power Project, the first such project in the state. LCRA continues to evaluate additional renewable energy options that complement its existing generation portfolio. LCRA's water and community services operations have grown through the years. LCRA began programs in the 1970s and 1980s to control water pollution and monitor water quality. It expanded its parks operations beginning in the 1990s to increase public access to the Highland Lakes and lower Colorado River. LCRA also worked with communities in its service area on projects designed to boost communities' economic development and improve their local quality of life.

References

External links

LCRA parks
web site
LCRA Corporate Archives' photostream
{{authority control Colorado River (Texas) River authorities of Texas State agencies of Texas Companies based in Austin, Texas Public utilities established in 1933 Water companies of the United States