OREANDA-NEWS. Wartsila has been awarded the contract to supply a 19 MW Smart Power Generation power plant to Montana-Dakota Utilities (MDU) in Sidney, Montana. New generation capacity is needed to meet the growing electricity demand in Montana-Dakota's service area. The power plant will be fast-track delivered and is scheduled to be fully operational during the fall of 2015.

"The power plant will help to meet the increasing peak load requirements of our customers, as well as supporting a reliable supply of electricity to the region around the Bakken oilfields in Eastern Montana and Western North Dakota," said Alan Welte, MDU's Director of Generation.

The power plant will add large internal combustion engine (ICE) based generation to Montana-Dakota Utilities' portfolio. The plant will comprise of two Wartsila 34SG engines running on natural gas.

"These units were included as part of our generation resource planning process and were selected due to size and cost," said Jay Skabo, vice president of electric supply for Montana-Dakota. "Other factors were the emissions profile, efficiency, anticipated maintenance profile and ease of construction."

The vast shale oil reserves of the Bakken formation, along with the successful use of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracking have led to an unprecedented economic boom in Montana and North Dakota, and hence the significant growth in electricity use. In October 2014, Wartsila announced a contract with Basin Electric Power Cooperative for a 112 MW Smart Power Generation power plant to be installed in Williston, North-Dakota - also in the Bakken area.

Wartsila's total installed generating capacity in the United States is currently some 2400 MW.