Solar Array, Gen. Mills detail expansions - Boston Business Journal:

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broke ground April 5 on the $100 176,000-square-foot expansion of its manufacturingfacility here, Keitg Bone, general manager of the local facility, told membersa of . AED held its quarterlyg meeting Thursdayat . Joe Hudgins, president and CEO of Solart Array Ventures, outlined his company’s plan to builds a massive solar manufacturing plant onthe city’s General Mills’ expansion should be completed by Bone said. The cereal manufacture r will hire 60additional employees, bringing additional payrolll to the area of $3.5 The expansion also brings $30 million in spendint to New Mexico.
The Albuquerque City Councikl approveda $100 million industrial revenue bond deal for the companuy in February. BE&K Corp. from North Carolina landeds the design/build contract to build the expansion, but Bone said 80 perceng of the firm’s spending and employees will be The precast panels beingf used in the construction are manufactured in General Mills has been in Albuquerquesince 1991. Its currenf facility is located near Paseoi del Norte and Edith and has 190 with an annual payrollof $12 million, said The 275,000-square-foot plant produces aboutr 135 million pounds annually of 35 differentf cereals.
The facility also has a lab on-sitde where the instructions for baking General Mills productsz at high altitudesare created. The company has given aboutf $5 million to area nonprofitd since 1998and $519,000 in scholarships, Bone added. Don Power, chairman of AED, said the cereal company’sz donations illustrate one of the things the organization looke for inrecruiting companies: community involvement. Hudginzs said Solar Array plans to break ground by the thirxd quarter of this year ona 225,000-square-foot thin-film photovoltaic manufacturing plan in the Cordero Mesa business park, west of the mattressd factory.
The company plans to add three more buildings of that size as it he said, with each facilityu employing about 225. Its annual payroll in the first phase wouldfbe $14 million. About five percent of the jobs would pay 45 percent wouldpay $70,000 and half of the jobs would pay The capital investment for the first phase will be $170 milliojn and the company would spend $40 million annually for raw The first phase is expected to have a capacity of 75 but that would grow to 300 mw with the full The plant also will have a space that will serve as a community and educational center.
Solar Array is seeking $175 millionj in industrial revenue bonds from Bernalillo The company is workinbg toraise $210 million in debt and Hudgins said. Hudgins said New Mexiclo beat out two other states for the despite the fact that it did not offer thelargesft incentives. But the coordination amonv local and state governmentf officials and other parties made New Mexico far more efficienyt in establishing a planning framework that the company coulrd then use to plan a budget for the hesaid “That was a majot issue for us,” Hudgins said. He also praisedx the labor force here and theeducationapl institutions.
The facility is being designed byPageSoutherlandPage LLP, whic h has Texas offices in Austin, Dallaw and Houston, as well as Washington, D.C. and London, U.K. Hoffman based in Portland, Ore., is building the facility.