Black & Veatch has joined with H.B. Zachry, the construction company, in a joint venture to provide full design, procurement, delivery, construction, startup, testing and initial operation of the Reliant Energy Choctaw County LLC power project.

Located on a 192 acre site near French Camp, Mississippi, the plant will use an air-cooled condenser to reject heat from the steam cycle, reducing the overall project water consumption to less than one tenth of that for natural gas powered generating facilities with conventional cooling towers. The project will be one of the largest examples of an air-cooled condenser on a combined cycle power plant in the USA.

Reliant is developing this plant to improve reliability and availability of electrical service to the surrounding region.

It consists of a 3-on-1 combined cycle design comprising three GE 7FB gas turbine generators; three triple-pressure reheat cycle HRSGs, each equipped for supplemental duct firing; and one reheat condensing steam turbine generator for a total nominal capacity of 800 MW. The combustion turbines will be designed to fire natural gas and will be equipped with dry low NOx burners. The HRSGs will be equipped with a selective catalytic reduction (SCR) system to control NOx emissions.

Commercial operation is scheduled for June 2003.