Lake Country Power, Iron Range Resources support shovel-ready real estate in Cohasset

Lake Country Power (LCP), one of Great River Energy’s member-owner cooperatives, celebrated the groundbreaking of its Cohasset Industrial Park Distribution System Upgrade, a project that promises to greatly enhance the shovel-ready development opportunities in Cohasset. 

LCP gathered with representatives from the city of Cohasset, Itasca County, Lake States Construction and the Minnesota Department of Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation (IRRR), to celebrate the anticipated impacts of the project and the funding programs that made it possible.

LCP will upgrade an existing 3.1-mile overhead circuit from the Cohasset substation to a larger diameter wire and reconfigure neighboring lines to transfer a portion of existing loads to different substations. The co-op will then install a mile of new underground cable in the Industrial Park, along with equipment needed to accommodate any new businesses that may move into the Industrial Park.

Once completed, these upgrades will increase the available electric utility capacity from 1 megawatt (MW) to 7 MW, allowing the city to respond to business expansion opportunities demanding shorter construction timelines and aggressive speed-to-market requirements. 

Numerous reports have documented the long lead times required to source components for electric utility upgrades, with some items reportedly taking several years to procure. By making these improvements in advance, the Cohasset Industrial Park won’t miss out on attracting businesses that require more than 1 MW of power on shorter timelines.

“There are already enough challenges that can delay economic development projects in rural communities,” said LCP General Manager Mark Bakk. “This project will ensure that the timeline for meeting a member-owner business’s electric utility needs will not be a limiting factor for the Cohasset Industrial Park, and it will improve reliability for all co-op members in that area.” 

The city, county and IRRR all contributed funds to support the project and LCP matched those funds for a total project budget of around $1,000,000. As a not-for-profit rural electric cooperative serving northeast Minnesota, the assets of LCP are owned by the people they serve.