Natural gas power plant finalizing PSB petition
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By CARLA OCCASO Staff Writer - Published: August 20, 2006
NEWPORT – Energy developers preparing to petition the Public Service Board for permission to build a 106-watt natural gas-fueled power plant in the Northeast Kingdom already have some agreements with Vermont utilities.
"We are talking to Green Mountain Power; we have no deal with Green Mountain Power," said Ron Duchin, a spokesman for Black Bear Energy, a subsidiary of a Virginia-based energy-consulting firm. "We are talking to VELCO and VPPSA (and Vermont Electric Co-op). We have some power purchase agreements negotiated already."
Duchin said he could not identify firms his company has contracts with until the PSB petition goes public. He said he hopes to file the petition by December.
Black Bear representatives will visit Vermont Monday to meet with engineers and others to ready documents for the PSB petition, Duchin said. He also said the company has had numerous conversations with officials from the Department of Public Service, the state agency overseeing utilities, and they appear to be supportive. But a DPS representative said the department needs to review formal paperwork before offering an opinion.
"As of this stage we haven't received the formal petition," said Steve Wark, a public information officer with the department on Friday. "We have been having informal discussions with the developers, and while there appears to be good information coming as a result of that, it is far too early to offer any type of formal opinion."
Developers would need to build a 22-mile pipeline from the Ayer's Cliff area in Quebec, Canada, to bring natural gas into the United States. The plan is to run the pipeline along the highway so private landowners would not be involved, Duchin said.
The facility would be located on about 100 acres near Newport City. The power plant would take up about 15 to 25 acres and the rest would be a safety buffer.
Duchin said the community would receive numerous benefits apart from the electricity.
"We anticipate the plant will employ 22 people full time for at least the next 20 years," Duchin said. "We figure the construction of the plant would range from 24 to 130 people to build."
About $1.5 million per year would go into the local economy through salaries alone, he said.
Other companies – like home heating fuel providers – could tap into the gas pipeline once it is built, he added.
If approved, Black Bear's plant would add a power resource to the 40 megawatt peaking power plant proposed for Swanton, said Steve Corse, general manager of the Vermont Public Power Supply, the organization that negotiates power purchase agreements for 14 municipally owned utilities. The Swanton project, known as Project 10, would only provide power during extreme heat and cold and times of peak use and is scheduled to be operating by next year.
VPPSA buys power for member utilities, he said, and a project like Black Bear would help provide a known quantity of electricity at a contracted price.
"The philosophy here at VPPSA is largely contract," Corse said. "Let's get a large portion of portfolio at a guaranteed price (so) you can forecast rates." It is wise to get a limited amount from the open market as well, he said. VPPSA does not have a contract with Black Bear, he said.
Besides this natural gas power facility, not many others are on the horizon, Corse said. A small 20-megawatt biomass facility is on the table in Readsboro, and Green Mountain Power may expand the Searsburg wind generation facility. Corse said the problem with renewable energy continues to be a high cost per kilowatt-hour.
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