Category: News

Sanford Nowlin Reporter- San Antonio Business Journal

Houston’s Platinum Energy Solutions Inc. will hire up to 200 people at a new South Side facility that will service clients extracting oil and gas in the Eagle Ford Shale.

Platinum has leased 50 acres at Braunig Industrial Park and is building new facilities there, including a plant to process sand for the hydraulic fracturing process used to extract oil in shale formations, according to company securities filings and economic development officials.

“From our conversations with the company, they expect to create 200 jobs with an average salary of $60,000,” says Mario Hernandez, CEO of the San Antonio Economic Development Foundation. “They’ll provide a variety of services to companies working in the shale. It’s certainly not a one-dimensional operation.”

The project joins a growing number of developments in South Bexar County by companies working in the Eagle Ford, one of the nation’s most-active petroleum plays.

Oilfield-services giant Halliburton Co. is building a 1,500-employee complex nearby, and a similar Baker Hughes Inc. facility will employ 500.

Although the EDF and other economic development groups met with Platinum during its site-selection process, none extended tax breaks or financial incentives to lure the company.

“It is our understanding that (Platinum) is using this facility to support logistics related to hydraulic fracturing,” says Lisa Lewis, spokeswoman for CPS Energy, which owns the acreage, located at Interstate 37, south of Loop 410. “That includes administrative functions, support lab/storage and maintenance facilities on the site.”

Officials with Platinum — which in February postponed a $126,000 million-to-$154,000 million initial public offering — didn’t return phone inquiries about the project.

Its broker, Terry Warth of CBRE Group, referred all questions back to the company.

Platinum provides hydraulic fracturing services, pressure pumping and sand to companies working the Eagle Ford and other shale plays.

Drillers pump sand into wells during the fracturing process to keep fissures propped open so oil and gas can flow up from the ground.

The company holds a contract with Petrohawk Energy Corp., one of the shale’s biggest acreage holders, according to its securities filings.

The Petrohawk deal, combined with a separate pact with Encana Corp. in Utah, is expected to generate average monthly revenues for Platinum of $23 million, the filing also states.

Build-out

Platinum, formed in fall 2010, reported a $23.7 million net loss on revenues of $9.9 million for the nine months ended, Sept. 30, 2011, according to the most recent financial data included it its filings.

Platinum also reports that it is developing a “facility near San Antonio” to process and deliver frac sand to its shale customers. The company has leased up to 461 railcars for transporting raw material from an independent mining supplier, and it is negotiating use of a nearby rail line.

The San Antonio facility will include a high-capacity dryer and covered storage, according to SEC documents. The plant is expected to be operational this spring.

“Because we will not be dependent on third-party suppliers for dry sand or transportation systems, we believe that this will enable us to deliver (supplies) and equipment quickly to our fracturing jobs on short notice,” the company states. “We expect to be able to process the raw wet sand at lower cost than we would typically pay for dry frac sand from outside suppliers allowing us to capture additional margins.”

San Antonio construction firm Yantis Co. is among the contractors building a sand plant, an administrative building and a railyard for Platinum at the site, President Mike Yantis confirmed. Officials with the project’s general contractor, Florida-based DL Porter Constructors Inc., were unavailable at press time.

Yantis says his firm is conducting $3 million in work on the site. However, he declined to place a dollar amount on the overall project.

The development is scheduled for completion in October, although a portion of the facility will be ready sooner.

“We’re pushing,” Yantis says. “They wanted us done with the first phase in the next two to three months.”

Relocating and expanding oilfield-services companies created 2,650 San Antonio-area jobs last year, the EDF’s Hernandez says. That accounts for more than half the jobs his organization worked to attract.

Currently, the EDF is in talks with at least four additional shale-related prospects, each of which is expected to employ 50 to 100 people, Hernandez adds.

“The next phase for us is attracting the second-tier suppliers,” he says. “The investments will be smaller than Halliburton and Baker Hughes, but they’re still bringing good jobs to San Antonio.”

Rain on Thursday halted the excavation of an East Side landfill where officials have been searching this week for evidence in the disappearance of an Arizona infant. “The excavation has been suspended for the day because of the inclement weather,” said San Antonio Police Department spokeswoman Sandy Gutierrez. “But we hope to resume Friday.” Police Chief William McManus said at a news conference Tuesday that the landfill was targeted because it’s tied to a trash bin at a hotel on San Pedro Avenue where Elizabeth Johnson, 23, claimed to have suffocated Gabriel Johnson, placed him in a diaper bag and disposed of his body.

Police continue to investigate a separate missing person case on the 9-month-old because Johnson also claimed she gave him to a couple in a San Antonio park.
Private companies have donated more than $100,000 worth of personnel, equipment and services for the excavation, which began at the Tessman Road Landfill Tuesday. It will take several more days to remove a total of 1.8 million cubic feet of debris that officials have estimated sits atop a layer where police believe the baby’s remains or evidence could be.

The particular section of the landfill has been cordoned off since Dec. 27, the day Johnson allegedly sent a text message to Gabriel’s father, Logan McQueary, saying she killed the boy.
Vicky Waddy, a spokeswoman for Zachry Construction Corp., said her company’s work has also temporarily halted at the site, but five employees have been operating an excavator and three dump trucks in the dig since Tuesday.

She estimated the cost of the employees’ work, which includes loading dump trucks with debris and unloading the dump trucks at another section of the landfill, is $30,000. But that amount could change if rain continues to fall, complicating the operation.

“The problem isn’t just the rain coming down, but whether there’s a stable foundation for our excavator,” she said.
A spokesman for Yantis Co. said a crew is on standby to help police in the second phase of the landfill operation, which includes sifting through debris for evidence. That process, which costs an estimated $30,000, will begin once the landfill site has been excavated to 45 feet, police said.

Yantis employees will then use equipment, including two excavators, to move the debris to a nearby secure site, which police have declined to disclose, to allow for the arduous process of searching through the trash. Police will use search teams and cadaver dogs, McManus said.

“Right now, we’re waiting for the Zachry crews to finish their part,” said Yantis spokesman Paul Basaldua. “We hope to start sometime next week, pending weather. If it continues to rain, it’s harder to sift through that material because it becomes more compacted and claylike.”

Meanwhile, Johnson, who was arrested in Florida, remains jailed in Arizona on charges of kidnapping, custodial interference and child abuse.

Donations in search for baby
A number of private companies are donating personnel, equipment and services in the landfill excavation and search for missing baby Gabriel Johnson, ensuring taxpayer dollars are not required to cover costs that are estimated to be well above $100,000.

• Zachry Construction Corp.
• Yantis Co.
• M&M Contracting
• Holt Construction
• United Site Services
• Home Depot
• H-E-B
• Bexar County Junior Livestock
• Martinez Social Club

That progress hasn’t provided relief yet to residents of Ventura Heights subdivision in East Bexar County, where deep, treacherous potholes refilled with rainfall Wednesday. But as a temporary fix, a developer with no current stake in the subdivision offered to patch some of its worst potholes in the next week.

In a letter to the county, Yantis Co. President Michael Yantis Jr. said that although it wasn’t the cause of the road problems, “I feel like we can be part of a temporary solution that will allow the Ventura Heights residents full use of their streets.” Accepting the offer, County Engineer Renee Green responded: “We understand that this is not a permanent fix and will continue to work with the homeowners to develop a permanent solution to their street problems.” In the meantime, the county, which disavows responsibility for maintaining the substandard roads, is extracting agreements from the developers it can locate. When they can’t be found, the county is withholding driveway permits and holding up plats, but isn’t authorized to do repairs, officials said.
Ventura Heights’ road woes sparked the countywide survey that was outlined at Commissioner’s Court on Tuesday. Residents of the neighborhood, in an unincorporated area near Converse, implored officials – again – to remedy their plight.

Officials offered several long-term options. One plan would have the budget-strapped county assume responsibility for Ventura Heights’ roads, making all taxpayers responsible for maintenance. In other scenarios, a special district could be formed where a road maintenance tax would be imposed for 30 years; or residents could be required to pay a share of the upkeep.

In May, the county estimated it would cost $1.3 million to bring Ventura Heights’ streets into compliance at a cost of $7,731.84 for each of the 170 homes.
Green told commissioners that 121 subdivisions in unincorporated areas, whose streets and drains have been out of warranty for two or more years, have been examined in recent months. Sixteen of them have completed needed repairs and 52 promised to make fixes by early October, she said.

The 121 subdivisions had 37 developers, seven of which couldn’t be located, Green said. The missing seven are responsible for 20 subdivisions, including Ventura Heights.
No plans of action to remedy road problems have been submitted by 33 of the subdivisions whose developers were located. However, about half have such plans in the works.
“I’m encouraged by the response we’ve received from the builders and we will continue to diligently work to bring all of Bexar County’s residential roads into compliance,” Green said.
Commissioner Tommy Adkisson, whose Precinct 4 includes Ventura Heights, said the county, by law, has been constrained in its response.

“We were advised by the district attorney’s office that if you go in there and fix it, that’s a de facto adoption of the subdivision,” Adkisson said.

Friday, May 7, 2010 San Antonio Business Journal – by Tricia Lynn Silva

Work has begun on the latest, and largest, solar-energy project in greater San Antonio.

Yantis Co. and KFW Engineers and Surveying, both based in San Antonio, recently started construction on what is known as the Blue Wing Solar project. The development calls for the installation of 214,000 solar photovoltaic modules, or solar panels.

These panels will be installed on a site of roughly 140 acres along the intersection of Interstate Highway 37 and U.S. Highway 181, just southeast of San Antonio, explains Cris Eugster, executive vice president and sustainability officer for CPS Energy — which is creating the solar farm in partnership with Boulder, Colo.-based juwi solar Inc., a developer of solar, wind and biomass power plants.

Yantis, a general contracting firm, is providing the site work for the project. KFW is the civil engineer.

The farm is slated to be up and generating solar power for the San Antonio area this year, Eugster says.

In the past, Eugster adds, CPS Energy has not invested heavily in solar energy. Prior to Blue Wing, the largest solar-power project was the 200-kilowatt system installed on the roof of the Full Goods Building at the Pearl Brewery site near downtown San Antonio — a joint development between CPS Energy and Silver Ventures.

The Blue Wing solar farm, Eugster says, is representative of CPS Energy’s long-term investment in some newer technologies — like renewable energy sources — for the purpose of providing an affordable source of energy to the community.

Blue Wing is also a vast departure from the kinds of projects that Yantis and KFW have worked on in the past, say Paul Basaldua and George Weron of Yantis and KFW, respectively.

But this non-traditional project has also come with a unique set of challenges.

“There were no (building) codes to speak of on how to develop (the solar farm),” says Weron, a cofounder of KFW.

Weron gives credit to both City of San Antonio and Bexar County leaders for their help in coming up with the development codes for the solar farm. That work, he adds, will not only serve Blue Wing, but will be vital to future solar-power projects that could be created in San Antonio.

“We are serving as pioneers (for solar-power development,)” he adds.

“To be on the cutting edge of the development industry, we want to be a part of that,” adds Basaldua, who is the director of business development for Yantis.

KFW Vice President Blaine Lopez adds that Blue Wing will be very visible to those traveling along Interstate Highway 37, from cities like Corpus Christi and Pleasanton.

“It’s a nice introduction to San Antonio, (and how the city is) taking a step forward in renewable energy,” he says.

Under the terms of the agreement between CPS and juwi, the latter will provide CPS with electricity on a wholesale basis for 30 years. The Blue Wing project is expected to generate 14 megawatts of power — about as much electricity as that produced by roughly 1,800 homes on an annual basis.

Sums up Eugster: “It’s an exciting milestone for San Antonio.”

Speaking of green
The Central Texas-Balcones Chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) recently announced that as of March 31, 2010, Central Texas boasts 62 LEED-certified buildings — up from 24 as of first-quarter 2008.

“This number highlights the increasing move toward green building practices, particularly in the major centers of Austin, San Antonio and Waco,” observes James Andrews, 2010 chairman of the board for the Central Texas Green Building Council.

Andrews’ organization reports that, in San Antonio alone, there are presently 14 LEED-certified properties. Three major area businesses, for example, are now headquartered in LEED-certified buildings: Rackspace Managed Hosting, Tesoro and Port San Antonio.

Retail roundup
New assignment: The San Antonio offices of The Weitzman Group and Cencor Realty Services have been hired to lease and manage, respectively, Bandera Oaks. The center spans 64,570 square feet along the east quadrant of Loop 1604 and Bandera Road.

Lex Lutto and Gene Williams of the Weitzman commercial retail division in San Antonio will head up the leasing for Bandera Oaks.

Karen Waring, director of property/asset management for the local Cencor office, will head up the management of the center.
Bandera Oaks is anchored by Office Depot and Petco. Other tenants include Pei Wei Asian Diner, Bright Now! Dental and Wachovia.

New restaurant: The doors are open at La Gloria, the newest restaurant at Pearl and the latest culinary endeavor for local chef Johnny Hernandez. Pearl is an urban retail and residential complex that is being created on the site of the former Pearl Brewery.

Mom rules! According to a recent report by Washington, D.C.-based the National Retail Federation (NRF), the average person will spend $126.90 on Mother’s Day gifts for momma — up from $123.89 last year.

Total spending for Mother’s Day 2010 is expected to reach $14.6 billion — up from $14.1 billion in 2009.

TRICIA LYNN SILVA’s Real Estate Roundup column appears weekly. Silva can be reached via e-mail at [email protected], or by phone at 210-477-0849.

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Company facts: Yantis Co. is a turnkey site construction company which performs excavation,  rock  milling, utility construc­ tion, asphalt paving and concrete work on residential,  commercial and  public sector projects. Yantis is a family-owned business that has three  generations of the  Yantis family involved in  the  company. Cousins Blake and Mike Jr. currently serve as CEO and  president, respectively. Blake is cred­ ited with overhauling  the company’s inter­ nal accounting  software, the  introduction of a massive information systems program, and the complete reorganization  of Yantis’ equipment  department The company has been a part  of a number  of construction projects  in San  Antonio,  including  utility work for Six Flags FiestaTexas. It also per­ forms public projects, including the Wurz­ bach Parkway expansion and 15 major proj­ ects at San Antonio International Airport.

Accolades: Yantis has been acknowledged multiple times as one of”America’s 500 Fast­ est Growing Private Companies” by Inc. magazine. In addition, the firm has appeared on the Aggie 100, which recognizes the fast­ est-growing companies that are either owned oded by an Aggie/A&M graduate.

Trivia: John Yantis, a former construction­ equipment  salesman,   founded   the  firm with $2,000 -$1,000 of which he brought in himself, the  other  $1,000 coming from his partner Norman Harwell. They made $40,000 in their first month. Harwell sold his portion of the business to John in 1976.