SNC SNC Lavalin Group Inc

MONTREAL, Feb. 22, 2011 /CNW/ -- MONTREAL, Feb. 22, 2011 /CNW Telbec/ - SNC-Lavalin is pleased to announce that Contact Energy (Wellington, NZ) has awarded the McConnell Dowell/SNC-Lavalin/Parsons Brinkerhoff joint venture an engineering, procurement, construction (EPC) contract for the construction of the 166 MW Te Mihi geothermal project.  Two new geothermal power units of 83 MW each will be constructed near the Wairakei geothermal power station, northwest of Taupo, NZ.  Once completed, approximately 45 MW of the existing Wairakei geothermal station will be decommissioned, resulting in a net increase from the combined Te Mihi and Wairakei stations of 114 megawatts. "We are pleased to be expanding our experience in the worldwide renewable energy market, and to be working with a leading green energy company like Contact Energy" said Patrick Lamarre, Executive Vice-President, SNC-Lavalin Group.  "Geothermal power is playing an increasingly important role in the industry, and our mandate to execute on this contract is a testament of our ability to successfully deliver complex projects all over the world." Contact Managing Director, David Baldwin, says the commitment to Te Mihi reflects the company's view that geothermal is New Zealand's most cost effective new base load generation. "The additional 114 megawatts is expected to be required by the market by 2013 as economic growth resumes, and will also contribute to lowering Contact's average cost of generation," he said. SNC-Lavalin (TSX:SNC) is one of the leading engineering and construction groups in the world and a major player in the ownership of infrastructure, and in the provision of operations and maintenance services. SNC-Lavalin has offices across Canada and in over 35 other countries around the world, and is currently working in some 100 countries. In business since 1911, the Company celebrates its 100(th) anniversary in 2011. www.snclavalin.com. To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.cnw.ca/en/releases/archive/February2011/22/c4704.html table valign="top" cellspacing="0" border="1" class="cnwBorderedTable"tr valign="top"td align="left"Media/td td align="left"Investors/td/tr tr valign="top"td align="left"Leslie Quintonbr/ Vice-President, Global Corporate Communications               br/ SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. br/ 514-393-8000, ext. 7354br/ a text-decoration="underline" href="mailto:leslie.quinton@snclavalin.com"leslie.quinton@snclavalin.com/a/td td align="left"Denis Jasminbr/ Vice-President, Investor Relationsbr/ SNC-Lavalin Group Inc.br/ 514-393-8000, ext. 7553br/ a href="mailto:leslie.quinton@snclavalin.com"denis.jasmin@snclavalin.com/a/td/tr/table

Copyright