Sandow Lakes Energy has issued a statement asserting that its new power plant will not be excessively noisy, claiming that sound levels at the nearest property line will be comparable to those of a quiet library.
The company emphasizes that the facility will bolster the local tax base and create hundreds of temporary construction jobs along with dozens of permanent positions. Sandow Lakes Energy also shared multiple letters from local residents expressing their support for the project.
“We acknowledge the pressing need for a reliable, efficient, and environmentally responsible energy production to foster our region’s growth and economic development,” noted Nathan Bland, president of the municipal development district in Rockdale, located approximately 20 miles from the proposed site.
Brown stands next to a pond on his property ringed with cypress trees he planted 30 years ago.
Credit: Dylan Baddour/Inside Climate News
The facility is set to connect to Texas’ public electricity grid, with many letters of support emphasizing the need for grid reliability. However, permitting documents indicate that the 1,200 MW plant will only contribute 80 MW to the grid temporarily, with the majority of the power designated for private customers.
According to a permit review conducted by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, “Electricity will continue to be sold to the public until all of the private customers have completed projects slated to accept the power being generated.”
While Sandow has not disclosed the identities of these private customers, the plant forms part of a large, mixed-use development spanning rural Lee and Milam counties. This area already hosts several energy-intensive operations, including Riot Platforms, which claims to be the largest cryptocurrency mining facility in North America. In April, Riot announced its acquisition of an additional 125 MW cryptocurrency mine previously managed by Rhodium, bringing the total capacity in Rockdale to as much as 700 MW. Another operation by Bitmain, a global leader in Bitcoin mining, has a current capacity of 560 MW and plans to expand by an additional 180 MW in 2026.
In April, a public meeting was held at the volunteer fire department in Blue, where residents voiced their concerns regarding the power plant to Texas regulators and Sandow representatives. Brown, who owns a wildlife sanctuary, expressed his apprehensions directly to the developers, highlighting the chosen location of the plant at the edge of Sandow’s expansive 33,000-acre development, which is situated far from Rockdale’s industrial complex but in close proximity to several homes in Blue.
“You don’t want to put it up into the middle of your property where you could deal with the negative consequences,” Brown remarked to the developers. “So it looks to me like you are wanting to make money, in the process of which you want to strew grief in your path and make us bear the environmental costs of your profit.”
Inside Climate News’ Peter Aldhous contributed to this report.
This story originally appeared on Inside Climate News.
