NorthWestern Corp. plans to seek proposals for about 280 MW of dispatchable resources, including generation, storage, and demand-side products, that will be ready to start delivering services in Montana in 2023.

The company, which does business in the state as NorthWestern Energy, intends to issue a request for proposals, or RFP, in January 2020, according to a Dec. 12 news release.

NorthWestern said it has capacity deficit of nominally 450 MW, but taking into account unexpected outages and demand events, is closer to about 650 MW. This amount is expected to grow to 725 MW by 2025 due to expiring power purchase agreements and modest customer growth.

To help address that shortfall, NorthWestern announced a deal Dec. 10 to acquire an additional stake in the Colstrip coal-fired plant in Montana.

The planned RFP aims to secure reliable and cost effective resources to cover part of the current capacity deficit. NorthWestern may issue additional RFPs in the future.

All communication related to the RFP should be through email directed to Aion Energy LLC, the RFP administrator, at NWEMT-2020RFP@aionenergyllc.com. Interested parties must submit a prequalification form and execute a nondisclosure agreement by 5 p.m. MT on Jan. 10, 2020.