Power Authority Hydropower to Support Buffalo Firm's Plans to Create 12 New Jobs

Contact
Michael Saltzman
914-390-8181
michael.saltzman@nypa.gov

printer-friendly version

April 26, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW YORK—The New York Power Authority (NYPA) Trustees Tuesday approved an allocation of low-cost hydropower from the Niagara Power Project for Graphic Controls, LLC, a Buffalo company undertaking a $1.8 million expansion that will lead to12 additional jobs.

“Once again, we’re demonstrating the unique value of Niagara hydropower for new jobs in Western New York,” said Louis P. Ciminelli, NYPA chairman and a resident of Buffalo. “We continue to forge ahead on this front, thanks to Governor George Pataki’s efforts and those of state and local economic development organizations, in maximizing the job benefits of this vital generating facility and supporting the region’s economy.”

Ciminelli noted that the Western New York Advisory Group, consisting of the Power Authority, Niagara Mohawk, Empire State Development Corp. and the Buffalo Niagara Enterprise, recommends the allocations to businesses from two blocks of Niagara hydropower, known as replacement power and expansion power.  In late 2003, the members of the group signed a Memorandum of Understanding for allocations of available Niagara power on a continuous basis.

Since the agreement, the Power Authority has made allocations to a total of 30 Western New York companies, including the one approved Tuesday.

Graphic Controls, which has operated in Buffalo since the1940s, is a world leader in producing quality precision charts and marking systems for recording vital information for medical and industrial processes.

The company, which currently employs 245 people, is adding a new printing press for expanding the output of its operation, which runs round-the-clock, seven days a week.

It will receive an allocation of 330 kilowatts (kw) of replacement power, which will help maintain its competitive position and presence in Buffalo. The company is at 400 Exchange St.

Replacement power is a 445,000-kw block of power reserved for manufacturers within a 30-mile radius of the Niagara Project. A second, smaller block of power—expansion power—totals 250,000 kw. Together, the two blocks are linked to more than 43,000 jobs in Western New York.

The 2,400,000-kw Niagara Project, in the Town of Lewiston, is the single largest source of electricity in New York State. It provides some of the state’s lowest cost power, along with a second NYPA hydroelectric project, the St. Lawrence-Franklin D. Roosevelt Project in Massena.