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Gridcensus

Helms Energy Center

Brownfield

Helm, Fresno, California · Wellhead Services, Inc

Legacy capacity
48
MW

Helms Energy Center is a natural gas plant in Helm, Fresno, California. Retired generation sites are among the most attractive datacenter redevelopment targets: the existing interconnection was sized for roughly 48 MW of generation, so the grid hookup, transmission rights, and often cooling-water access are already in place — collapsing the speed-to-power timeline versus a greenfield build.

Former use & capacity

Former usenatural gas plant
Site typeretired_plant
Existing capacity48 MW
EIA plant ID#56955

Grid hookup & remediation

Nearest substation0.0 mi
Operator address12688 S. Colorado Avenue, Helm, CA, 93627
Why this site is datacenter-attractive: a natural gas plant of this scale leaves behind a high-capacity grid interconnection that a new load can re-use, frequently shaving years off the interconnection queue. Retired-plant sites also tend to be already zoned for heavy industrial use with established road, rail, and water infrastructure.

Site conditions & market — Fresno County

County-level intelligence for this site's location — the power economics, water, hazard, connectivity, and workforce a developer screens before ever visiting. Assembled from FEMA NRI, BLS QCEW, FCC BDC, USGS water-use, and EIA.

Market & workforce

Total employment (laborshed)344,500
IT / tech employment63
Construction employment22,501
Land value$16,378/acre

Power economics & interconnection

Commercial power rate28.96¢/kWh
Industrial power rate22.28¢/kWh
Load growth (FERC-714)1.3%

Water & cooling

Water stressHigh
Public water supply157.1 MGD
Industrial water use10.5 MGD
Cooling degree days1,000
Mean annual temp59°F

Hazard, flood & connectivity

FEMA risk index48.0 · Relatively High
Fiber providers13 · 38% served

County-level context — address-level utility offerings and flood zoning vary within the county. Confirm site-specific service with the utility and a Phase I ESA.

Nearby brownfield & retired-generation sites

A proximity screen of other retired-plant, contaminated, and EPA-flagged sites near Helms Energy Center — the environmental neighborhood, ranked by legacy grid capacity.

SiteFormer useLegacy MWDistanceCleanup status
Aquamarine Solar Projectformer brownfield site25023.9 micleanup_complete
Gates Peakernatural gas plant4727.5 mi—
Fresno Cogen Partnersnatural gas plant324.7 mi—
Westlands Solar Park Phase Iformer brownfield site223.9 micleanup_complete

Derived from GridCensus's retired-generator & EPA brownfield dataset. Not a substitute for an ASTM E1527 Phase I environmental radius report.

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Nearby datacenter candidate sites

Scored candidate sites near Helms Energy Center, ranked by DC Readiness.

Candidate sites near Helms Energy Center
SiteTypeStateCountyVoltageCapacityQueue waitScore
ASHLAN AVESubstation-AdjacentCAFresno County230 kV300 MW8.2 yrs53.9
OZ FresnoGreenfieldCAFresno——5.7 yrs53.9
GREGGSubstation-AdjacentCAFresno County230 kV300 MW8.2 yrs53.7
BORDENSubstation-AdjacentCAFresno County230 kV300 MW8.2 yrs53.2
TAP307972Substation-AdjacentCAFresno County230 kV300 MW8.2 yrs53.1
UNKNOWN301827Substation-AdjacentCAFresno County230 kV300 MW8.2 yrs53.1
MANCHESTERSubstation-AdjacentCAFresno County115 kV100 MW8.2 yrs52.5
OZ FresnoGreenfieldCAFresno——5.7 yrs52.0

Nearby internet exchanges

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Dataset updated . Screening estimates derived from public data sources.

Brownfield attributes are derived from EIA retired-generator and EPA public data. Existing capacity reflects the retired plant's historical nameplate, not deliverable interconnection for a new load. Confirm reusable interconnection rights, remediation status, and site availability with the utility, ISO, and current owner.

Go deeper than the public screen

Every site and score for Helms Energy Center, Helm, Fresno, California is free to browse. Pro adds Watchtower on 25 sites, alerts when new candidate sites, datacenters or interconnection-queue requests appear in your markets, score and capacity history, and CSV export. Enterprise adds team seats, weekly data files for all 147,272 sites, the REST API and an MCP server for AI tools.