In November 2022 Frattalone was awarded a contract by Knobelsdorff Electric for the civil work on the Prairie Island Casino Solar PV + Geothermal Project at the site near Red Wing, MN.
Frattalone and Knobelsdorff have developed a strong partnership on solar projects in recent years and this project proved true to that relationship. Knobelsdorff went to bat to bring in Frattalone as their civil sitework contractor of choice for the work.
The main portion of the project entails grading of over 210,000 CY of river sand dredged form the Mississippi River and piled east of the Casino several years ago. The pile was high on the southern side and low on the Northern side, requiring the material to be flipped around to allow a slope facing to the Southern sky rather than the Northern sky.
The Frattalone team mobilized quickly and got started under the direction of Mitch Larson and Mitch Mandelkow. The site required the use of (1) 349 Excavator, (2) D6T Dozers, (3) 745 Off Road Trucks and other support equipment.
In addition to the dredged material moved, Frattalone will place over 15,000 tons of Class 5 aggregate to cover the entire array area at the top of the site and the various roads surrounding the project. In the spring the lower slopes will be covered with 2,000 + tons of rip rap for erosion protection. Topsoiling of the slopes and Erosion Control blanket will also be placed.
We were able to work through the months of December and January to get the project turned over to Knobelsdorff to start on their scope of work. It presented a few challenges to accomplish this, but the Frattalone Team was able prevail and complete the work on time.
