Evans says Panda is "self-performing"—or making its own, separate design and construction arrangements for—three critical connections to all its new plants: the natural-gas pipelines, the water pipelines and the interconnections to the electric grid.

Bill Griffin, CEO at Gemma Power Systems, says Gemma, Lane Construction and Siemens have been involved in the Liberty and Patriot projects for some time and hit the ground running after the projects' financial closings last August and December, respectively. At Liberty, most of the foundation work already has been completed, and erection of the heat-recovery steam generators is under way.

"It's always a challenge to secure large numbers of skilled crafts people in areas that aren't heavily populated," says Griffin of the Towanda and Williamsport sites. He adds, however, that the shale-gas development that quickly transformed Pennsylvania's Marcellus region "has been winding down. That's actually helped us a bit" because the shale boom attracted skilled workers to the area, some of whom welcome the opportunity to work on the Panda projects.

The Gemma CEO says the two plants "will be just-in-time deliveries—we don't want to be double- handling," says Griffin. Deliveries to the sites will be made largely by rail, with some of the largest equipment being first barged up the Hudson River to the Port of Albany, where it is off-loaded onto railcars.

While still overseeing Panda's five units currently under construction in Texas and Pennsylvania, Evans also is looking ahead to the next two projects the company plans to develop: the 859-MW Mattawoman project in Brandywine, Md., and the 750-MW Stonewall project in Leesburg, Va. Both are expected to be on line in 2017.