NEW ORLEANS — The new power substation on the grounds of the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board’s Carrollton plant is completed.
Workers are now in the process of constructing a series of electrical connections to the utility’s drainage and water pumps and other key components.
The complex would replace an old and unreliable system of turbines and generators.
“We had been counting on $29 million to finish this project completely and deliver a top-of-the-art, very dependable project,” SWBNO Executive Director Ghassan Korban said on Friday’s WWL Louisiana Morning News.
Construction costs have risen from original estimates of $300 million to about $350 million.
So far, the state has obligated about $55 million toward the project.
In April, SWBNO made a pitch for additional funding.
“That would go toward a new operations center with a modern control room and have modern facilities as well as a larger switch gear to allow to further expand what we are already doing and to connect this new power to more of our water pumps,” the utility’s Deputy Superintendent Kaitlin Tymrak told members of the Joint Legislative Capital Outlay Committee.
Korban said the utility’s $29 million request was not included in the state’s final building budget.
“We didn’t get the money at the end of the session. We’re still going to deliver a project by the middle of next year, but it will have missing components. It will force us to use manual processes here and there, so it still won’t be how it was designed.”
There are other potential buckets of state money for the project.
The legislature recently diverted about 700 million dollars from the state savings account for various public infrastructure projects. Some of that money could be used for the power complex.
“I’m pretty hopeful we will eventually, through talks and collaboration between the city administration and the city council and the legislators and the governor’s office, I think that all are fully aware of how critical the project is,” Korban said.
Governor Jeff Landry is expected to be in New Orleans as early as next week for what is expected to be an announcement about the Sewerage and Water Board’s power complex.
The governor’s office scheduled a briefing to announce, “funding improvements” for the project on Wednesday.
It was postponed because of scheduling conflicts.
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