Indianapolis, IN, March 17, 2009 - Horizon Wind Energy has selected Bowen Engineering as the balance of plant contractor for the Meadow Lake wind farm in White County, Indiana. This 200 megawatt facility is the first of several wind farms Horizon is developing in Indiana.
“Horizon is a leader in wind energy, and our team is pleased to work with such an outstanding firm,” said Bowen Operations Manager Dennis Ward. “Renewable energy, particularly wind energy, is in a growth phase. We are excited to see these technologies come to Indiana, and we are proud to contribute to sustainable power generation.”
Bowen will begin work immediately, providing overall site coordination and logistics as well as constructing the turbine foundations and road improvements. A total of one hundred twenty one (121) wind turbine generators will be erected in farm fields and connected to a new electrical substation for integration into the transmission grid. The project will be completed by October, 2009.
For additional information about the Meadow Lake wind farm, contact David Wrightsman at Bowen Engineering or visit www.BowenEngineering.com.
ABOUT BOWEN ENGINEERING - Founded in 1967, Bowen Engineering is a general contractor focused on water, wind and power construction. Headquartered in Indiana, the company has branch offices in Tennessee and Ohio and performs work across the United States.
ABOUT HORIZION WIND ENERGY - Horizon Wind Energy LLC develops, constructs, owns and operates wind farms throughout North America. Based in Houston, Texas with over 25 offices across the United States, Horizon has developed more than 2,500 megawatts and operates over 2,000 megawatts of wind farms. Horizon is owned by EDP Renewables, a global leader in the renewable energy sector that designs, develops, manages and operates power plants that generate electricity using renewable energy sources.
Source: Bowen Engineering Corporation
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Region No. 1 in steelmaking
By Andrea Holecek
andrea.holecek@nwi.com, (219) 933-3316 | Wednesday, March 18, 2009
For the first time in more than six years, the Northwest Indiana/Chicago area became the country's top steel-producing region during the week ending March 14.
Though it has held the title of top steel producer in the past, the Calumet Region lost the distinction in October 2002 as more steel companies opened mills in the southern United States. The move south came at the same time the local region's integrated mills idled production in the midst of a flood of cheap, imported steel.
The South held the title even through summer 2008, when all region mills were operating at full capacity. But the recent consolidation of production here as a result of the economic downturn returned Northwest Indiana and its surrounding area to the top of the list.
Northwest Indiana is one of the few areas of the country in which steel giants U.S. Steel Corp. and ArcelorMittal are concentrating production.
"We’re seeing regional variations in levels of production as the industry responds to market demand," said Nancy Gravatt, spokeswoman for the American Iron and Steel Institute, which compiles the weekly regional production statistics.
"The individual companies that make up the North American steel industry continually analyze market conditions and seek to adjust production levels consistent with customer demand, including temporarily idling certain facilities as we have seen in recent months," Gravatt said. "So there may be regional variations in production levels, which are a necessary response to current market conditions."
Copyright © 2009 nwi.com
andrea.holecek@nwi.com, (219) 933-3316 | Wednesday, March 18, 2009
For the first time in more than six years, the Northwest Indiana/Chicago area became the country's top steel-producing region during the week ending March 14.
Though it has held the title of top steel producer in the past, the Calumet Region lost the distinction in October 2002 as more steel companies opened mills in the southern United States. The move south came at the same time the local region's integrated mills idled production in the midst of a flood of cheap, imported steel.
The South held the title even through summer 2008, when all region mills were operating at full capacity. But the recent consolidation of production here as a result of the economic downturn returned Northwest Indiana and its surrounding area to the top of the list.
Northwest Indiana is one of the few areas of the country in which steel giants U.S. Steel Corp. and ArcelorMittal are concentrating production.
"We’re seeing regional variations in levels of production as the industry responds to market demand," said Nancy Gravatt, spokeswoman for the American Iron and Steel Institute, which compiles the weekly regional production statistics.
"The individual companies that make up the North American steel industry continually analyze market conditions and seek to adjust production levels consistent with customer demand, including temporarily idling certain facilities as we have seen in recent months," Gravatt said. "So there may be regional variations in production levels, which are a necessary response to current market conditions."
Copyright © 2009 nwi.com
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
As dome dissipates, $275M building begins
By Jeff Swiatek
jeff.swiatek@indystar.com
Excavators and cement trucks. Front-end loaders and tri-axle dump trucks. Compaction equipment and a cement crusher. All jostle for space on the site of the RCA Dome, where the last remnants of the stadium are being removed as construction starts on the $275 million expansion to the Indiana Convention Center.
One set of workers has started pouring concrete footings for the convention center's exhibit halls and three-story new entrance hall, while another group of workers finishes razing the dome and carting off its rubble.
Sabre Demolition of New York has two months left under its $3.5 million contract to remove the debris. A majority of it will be used as fill or recycled in other ways. A concrete crusher on site has created a small mountain of pebblized concrete that's being used as fill or to line roadbeds.
"Eighty percent (of the dome's debris) is not going to the landfill," said Tom Scheele, senior vice president at Shiel Sexton, the Indianapolis contractor that's managing the expansion project with Powers and Sons Construction of Gary.
Removing the dome's debris requires about 100 dump-truck loads a day.
The Indiana Stadium and Convention Building Authority is shooting to finish the massive expansion in late 2010 or early 2011. It will double the meeting and exhibit space in the convention center, allowing the city to host more and larger conventions.
"We are on schedule. The weather's been cooperative," said Lori Dunlap, deputy director of the authority, which offered a media tour of the site Monday.
Erection of steel beams for the expansion starts next month.
Scheele said construction of a 1,200-foot-long, 20-foot-high retaining wall at the rear of the site, adjoining railroad tracks that slice through Downtown, was slowed by the need to remove buried rubble and old foundations left over from when the dome was built in the early 1980s.
Other parts of the dome, like a concourse between it and the convention center, were "not necessarily what drawings show it to be. So we're always asking questions," Scheele said.
CEOs: State tops in region for business
Star report
Memo to staff: Indiana is the best place in the Midwest to do business. But nationally, it's slipping just a bit.
A national survey of 534 chief executives ranked the Hoosier state as the best state to do business in the Midwest for the second straight year, but only 11th in the nation, down three spots from last year's rankings.
The survey by Chief Executive magazine asked business leaders to evaluate states on a range of issues, including tax policies, quality of living and work force.
It ranked Indiana third in the nation in business friendliness, fourth in transportation and sixth in cost of business. Among Midwestern states, Indiana's rankings, respectively, were first, third and second.
The top five states were Texas, North Carolina, Florida, Georgia and Tennessee. The bottom five states (starting with dead last) were California, New York, Michigan, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
The full report can be found at www.chiefexecutive.net.
Memo to staff: Indiana is the best place in the Midwest to do business. But nationally, it's slipping just a bit.
A national survey of 534 chief executives ranked the Hoosier state as the best state to do business in the Midwest for the second straight year, but only 11th in the nation, down three spots from last year's rankings.
The survey by Chief Executive magazine asked business leaders to evaluate states on a range of issues, including tax policies, quality of living and work force.
It ranked Indiana third in the nation in business friendliness, fourth in transportation and sixth in cost of business. Among Midwestern states, Indiana's rankings, respectively, were first, third and second.
The top five states were Texas, North Carolina, Florida, Georgia and Tennessee. The bottom five states (starting with dead last) were California, New York, Michigan, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
The full report can be found at www.chiefexecutive.net.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Indiana: the best state to do business in the Midwest.
Midwest
InsideINdianaBusiness.com Report
A national publication has named Indiana as the best state to do business in the Midwest. It is the second consecutive year the state has taken the top honor according to "Chief Executive" magazine. Indiana ranked 11th in the nation, down three spots from its 2008 ranking. The magazine bases its ranking on surveys of more than 500 chief executive officers.
Source: Inside INdiana Business
InsideINdianaBusiness.com Report
A national publication has named Indiana as the best state to do business in the Midwest. It is the second consecutive year the state has taken the top honor according to "Chief Executive" magazine. Indiana ranked 11th in the nation, down three spots from its 2008 ranking. The magazine bases its ranking on surveys of more than 500 chief executive officers.
Source: Inside INdiana Business
Costly stretch of Ronald Reagan Parkway at Avon qualifies for funding
March 14, 2009
$12.5 million would pay for bridge over rail yards at Avon
By Bruce C. Smith
bruce.smith@indystar.com
Hopes are rising among Avon officials that the gush of federal money intended to stimulate the economy may finally pay for the most expensive piece of Ronald Reagan Parkway.
The town and Hendricks County are asking for $12.5 million to build about a mile of the road between U.S. 36 and County Road 100 South.
The section is so costly because it includes a long bridge to span the CSX Conrail yards.
Some other one-mile sections of the road have been built. The proposal is to connect I-70 to I-74 and north to I-65.
If the bridge over Conrail is built, then just one more mile from 100 South to near 200 South would complete the section between I-70 and U.S. 36 and give Avon a more direct route to the interstate and Indianapolis International Airport.
An application has been made for a grant from a pool of about $39.5 million of stimulus funding to the Indianapolis Regional Transportation Council. That agency coordinates planning of road and related projects for most of the metro area, including Hendricks County.
Lori Miser, executive director of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, said the metro agency's technical committee of engineers and planners agreed this week that the Reagan bridge could qualify for funding.
Final word on the projects to receive money is expected late this month after meetings of the regional planning organization's policy committee. The organization includes about 40 representatives of counties, cities and towns in the metro area.
The Ronald Reagan bridge over Conrail is the largest single project on the one-page list of projects vying for funding. They include new roads and repairs to existing bridges, mostly in Hendricks, Johnson and Marion counties.
For a project to qualify for the money, it must have been designed to federal standards, including environmental and other regulations. It also must be "shovel ready," meaning the design, engineering and purchase of land or right of way is done so construction could start within weeks.
Ronald Reagan Parkway, which has been discussed, designed and planned in sections for nearly 25 years, meets those requirements to qualify for the stimulus grants, according to Avon Town Manager Tom Klein.
He told a joint meeting of the Town Council and the town's Redevelopment Commission this week that other contenders for the funding were eliminated in recent days because they don't meet those requirements.
The highly visible $130 million construction of roundabouts on Keystone Avenue in Carmel doesn't qualify, he said, because "those were designed locally to local standards."
The second-largest project on the list of technically qualified proposals is a share of a $4.9 million streetscape reconstruction of U.S. 40, or Main Street, through Plainfield.
$12.5 million would pay for bridge over rail yards at Avon
By Bruce C. Smith
bruce.smith@indystar.com
Hopes are rising among Avon officials that the gush of federal money intended to stimulate the economy may finally pay for the most expensive piece of Ronald Reagan Parkway.
The town and Hendricks County are asking for $12.5 million to build about a mile of the road between U.S. 36 and County Road 100 South.
The section is so costly because it includes a long bridge to span the CSX Conrail yards.
Some other one-mile sections of the road have been built. The proposal is to connect I-70 to I-74 and north to I-65.
If the bridge over Conrail is built, then just one more mile from 100 South to near 200 South would complete the section between I-70 and U.S. 36 and give Avon a more direct route to the interstate and Indianapolis International Airport.
An application has been made for a grant from a pool of about $39.5 million of stimulus funding to the Indianapolis Regional Transportation Council. That agency coordinates planning of road and related projects for most of the metro area, including Hendricks County.
Lori Miser, executive director of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization, said the metro agency's technical committee of engineers and planners agreed this week that the Reagan bridge could qualify for funding.
Final word on the projects to receive money is expected late this month after meetings of the regional planning organization's policy committee. The organization includes about 40 representatives of counties, cities and towns in the metro area.
The Ronald Reagan bridge over Conrail is the largest single project on the one-page list of projects vying for funding. They include new roads and repairs to existing bridges, mostly in Hendricks, Johnson and Marion counties.
For a project to qualify for the money, it must have been designed to federal standards, including environmental and other regulations. It also must be "shovel ready," meaning the design, engineering and purchase of land or right of way is done so construction could start within weeks.
Ronald Reagan Parkway, which has been discussed, designed and planned in sections for nearly 25 years, meets those requirements to qualify for the stimulus grants, according to Avon Town Manager Tom Klein.
He told a joint meeting of the Town Council and the town's Redevelopment Commission this week that other contenders for the funding were eliminated in recent days because they don't meet those requirements.
The highly visible $130 million construction of roundabouts on Keystone Avenue in Carmel doesn't qualify, he said, because "those were designed locally to local standards."
The second-largest project on the list of technically qualified proposals is a share of a $4.9 million streetscape reconstruction of U.S. 40, or Main Street, through Plainfield.
For bicycle show's organizer, a long-shot bet on Indy paid off
On a recent chilly weekend, Indianapolis became the bustling hub of the U.S. bicycle industry.It seemed an unlikely scenario. But it just goes to show what a gutsy and determined entrepreneur can accomplish, even in this crummy economy.
Don Walker -- a trade show organizer who also operates a custom bicycle shop in Speedway -- took a big chance by bringing his North American Handmade Bicycle Show to Indianapolis for this year's event, which ran from Feb. 27 to March 1.
The show features the work of many of the world's top makers of handmade bicycles, including sleek racers, sweet single-speed urban bikes and artful innovations such as bikes made of bamboo.
Since its founding in 2005, the show had always been in places such as San Jose, Calif., and Portland, Ore. -- regions with reputations as hip cycling hotbeds.
Walker said his decision to bring the show to Indianapolis was greeted with skepticism and even disappointment. Some complained that Indianapolis lacked a cycling culture, he said. About 25 previous exhibitors chose to stay home.
Indianapolis, though, proved its pedal power.
This year's show, held at the Indiana Convention Center, attracted 118 exhibitors and more than 6,400 attendees. While a little smaller than last year's show in Portland, the turnout was impressive, considering the huge economic downturn of the past year.
It was even more impressive given Indianapolis' cycling underdog status.
"In the cycling world, when people think of cycling towns they think of Portland, San Diego, Seattle . . . and Austin, Texas, maybe. Indianapolis, frankly, isn't one of those," said Zack Vestal, technical editor for the Colorado-based cycling publication VeloNews.
Yet in one of his VeloNews.com postings from the show, Vestal wrote this: "Exhibitors commented on Saturday's huge crowds, and many shared the feeling that this was the best NAHBS ever."
Oregon-based frame builder Sacha White, owner of the Vanilla Workshop in Portland, was impressed that the show attracted visitors from multiple states, including Minnesota, Georgia and Florida.
He also sensed that attendees appreciated the show's first stop in the Midwest.
"We found people to be really warm and welcoming," White said.
California-based frame builder Craig Calfee, whose bamboo-made bikes have been featured in Time and Newsweek, also seemed pleasantly surprised.
"The turnout for the show was much higher than expected, and the genuine interest was on par with the Portland show," he wrote in an e-mail. "Indianapolis was pitched to the frame-builder community as a great location because of the proximity to a lot of cities in the region. That was certainly true!"
The show even had an international feel, with multiple overseas exhibitors. De Rosa, a legendary family-run Italian bike maker, made its first-ever appearance at the show this year.
Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I'm hopelessly hooked on bicycling -- as a competitive sport that pushes human limits, as a healthy form of recreation that gets families outdoors, and as an efficient means of transportation that unclogs roads and conserves energy.
This column, however, is not just about bikes. It's about how business people in Indiana can succeed by believing in this region and, at times, by overcoming preconceived notions of our state.
On the show floor, Walker was a friendly figure wearing a badge identifying him as the "Big Cheese." Yet last week, he was all business when asked to assess the show and those skeptical of his decision to bring it to Indianapolis.
"It was a great way for me to prove them wrong," Walker said.
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