Caithness is a privately held company that specializes in the development, acquisition, operation and management of environmentally friendly, fossil fuel projects as well as energy storage, wind, solar, and geothermal renewable power projects. Since its establishment in 1964, Caithness has built an extensive portfolio of leading-edge, environmentally friendly renewable and fossil fuel power generation facilities. Caithness and its affiliates have successfully developed, operated, and owned interests in 42 operating power projects including over 3,000 MW of gas turbine projects, 1,190 MW of wind projects, 495 MW of geothermal projects and 160 MW of solar projects.
The company’s initial investment strategy was centered on natural resource exploration (e.g., gold, silver, oil and gas). In the early 1980’s, Caithness decided to apply its experience in resource exploration and project development to the development of geothermal electric generating plants. For nearly a decade, Caithness concentrated its efforts almost exclusively on the development of three domestic geothermal projects: the 240 MW Coso Geothermal Project in California, the 60 MW Dixie Valley and 17 MW Steamboat Geothermal Projects in Nevada.
During the 1990s, momentum gained from these initiatives drove the company’s expansion into other areas of the independent power industry, including wind and solar, as well as simple and combined-cycle natural-gas powered generating facilities. At the same time, Caithness brought into the company senior executives with extensive power industry experience. After many years of successful operations of a fleet of generating plants, Caithness sold a portion of its portfolio of operating assets in 2007 to Arclight Capital Partners, which renamed the portfolio Terra-Gen Power. Since 2007, Caithness has refocused its efforts on the development of environmentally progressive fossil fuel projects, as well as wind, solar, and geothermal renewable power projects.
