Wood Products Company To Expand Into Mercer County

Gov. Joe Manchin and officials from Accurate Millworks Inc. today announced the company is locating operations in the USDA Forest Service Wood Education and Resource Center's rough mill facility in Princeton, creating as many as 30 jobs. Accurate Millworks has leased the Wood Education and Resource Center’s 42,000-square-foot factory as a hardwood molding and milling facility. The company’s operations will focus on milling kiln-dried basswood and poplar components for the window manufacturing industry.

AEP To Build $3 Billion Interstate Transmission Line

American Electric Power today announced plans to build a $3 billion, 550-mile transmission line from its John Amos Power Plant near Winfield, W.Va., to New Jersey. AEP officials say the new line will "reduce congestion costs, cut line losses, enhance reliability and provide the transmission capacity and flexibility that is critical for construction of new fuel-diverse generation, including renewables."

AEP will file the project proposal with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission today and will eventually file with the West Virginia Public Service Commission as well as regulators in all of the other states where the line would pass. The company said it has named the proposed 765-kilovolt line project the "AEP Interstate Project." It would begin at the John Amos Plant, connect through Doubs Station in Frederick County, Md., and terminate in the Deans Station in Middlesex County, N.J.

The company's target date for putting the line in service is 2014. American Electric Power said that date assumes it will take three years to acquire necessary approvals, determine the route and rights-of-way and five years for construction.

New Manufacturer To Invest $13 Million In Marshall County

Warren Distribution will invest $13 million to locate its lubricant blending operation in Marshall County, creating as many as 46 new jobs in Glen Dale, W.Va. The automotive supply company, which manufactures and distributes automotive aftermarket products, will build a system to pump bulk lubricants from barges into tanks inside and outside a 250,000-square-foot building for blending to proper specifications and packaging into pails and bottles, some of which will be made by Warren. Warren Distribution, Inc., based in Omaha, Neb., manufactures automotive and agricultural lubricants and functional fluids and sells a variety of lubricants, chemicals and auto accessories. Warren Distribution plans to be operating in its new West Virginia location by early 2007.

Glade Springs Resort Opens New Inn, Conference Facilities

A $10 million investment in The Resort at Glade Springs in Raleigh County was officially completed today. Governor Joe Manchin and company officials with EMCO opened the resort’s new lodging and conference facility. The Inn boasts 50 guest rooms, a new restaurant, The Rotunda, and a new ballroom named for Bill Bright, previous owner of the resort. In addition, the facility has 5,000 square feet of meeting space.

Company officials say the completion of this investment project firmly establishes The Resort at Glade Springs a top destination on par with some of the best resorts in the mid-Atlantic.