List of power stations in New Mexico

Sources of New Mexico utility-scale electricity generation:
full-year 2023[1]

  Wind (38.7%)
  Natural Gas (35.2%)
  Coal (19.1%)
  Solar (6.5%)
  Hydroelectric (0.3%)
  Geothermal (0.1%)
  Biomass (0.1%)

This is a list of electricity-generating power stations in the U.S. state of New Mexico, sorted by type and name. In 2022, New Mexico had a total summer capacity of 10,230 MW through all of its power plants, and a net generation of 40,889 GWh.[2] The electrical energy generation mix in 2023 was 38.7% wind, 35.2% natural gas, 19.1% coal and 6.5% solar PV. Biomass, geothermal, hydroelectric, and petroleum each generated less than a 0.5% share combined.[1]

Small-scale solar including customer-owned photovoltaic panels delivered net 702 GWh to New Mexico's electricity grid in 2023. This was less than one-third of the amount generated by the state's utility-scale photovoltaic plants.[1]

New Mexico hosts the nation's only long-term underground repository for waste from nuclear weapons research and production, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad. Extraction of the state's nearby Permian Basin oil reserves for transportation and other uses rose to the nation's third highest, contributing 6% of total U.S. production in 2018.[3] New Mexico's oil extraction included the flaring of over 35 billion cubic feet of associated petroleum gas in each of the years 2018 and 2019.[4] This amount of wasted natural gas could have generated about 5,000 GWh of electrical energy, an amount equal to 14% of the state's total annual generation.[5]

  1. ^ a b c "Electricity Data Browser, Net generation for all sectors, New Mexico, Fuel Type-Check all, Annual, 2001–23". www.eia.gov. Retrieved 2024-05-21.
  2. ^ "New Mexico Electricity Profile". U.S. Energy Information Administration. Retrieved 2022-07-18.
  3. ^ "New Mexico Electricity Profile Analysis". U.S. EIA. Retrieved 2021-01-07.
  4. ^ "Natural gas gross withdrawals - vented and flared". U.S. Energy Information Administration. Retrieved 2020-11-18.
  5. ^ "FAQ-How much coal, natural gas, or petroleum is used to generate a kilowatthour of electricity?". U.S. Energy Information Administration. Retrieved 2020-11-18.