DG Clean Power, LLC

Power play

Bellingham's message for Billerica, where plant is proposed : 'Zero impact on community...quite a bit of revenue'

By JENNIFER AMY MYERS, Lowell Sun Staff

BELLINGHAM -- Maple Street is a densely wooded, quiet residential street in this quaint 19-square-mile community of 22,000 people on the Rhode Island border. The street is the home of the Maple Ridge Country Club and 70-year-old Ma Glockner's Restaurant, proud birthplace of the "original berched chicken dinner."

Set back a few hundred yards off the road, adjacent to Ma Glockner's, is a 540-megawatt, electrical, combined-cycle power plant run by American National Power, similar to -- but about twice the size of -- the 340-megawatt peak power plant proposed by DG Clean Power for North Billerica.

The 3-year-old Bellingham plant's gas and steam turbines produce enough power each day to light 500,000 homes, but the neighbors don't seem to notice. There is no black smoke pouring from the 180-foot smokestacks, no loud noise or rumbling trucks.

Standing directly next to the plant, one can only hear a low hum, no louder that an air conditioner or refrigerator, and there is no noticeable odor in the crisp autumn air.

Cindy Collins has lived on Maple Street for one year and has all but forgotten about the power plant just down the street.

"It seems fine, no noise, no traffic," she said. "To tell you the truth the Dunkin' Donuts (a distribution center on nearby Depot Street) is more of a problem."

Al DiCampo, ANP's business manager, said the Bellingham plant is designed to run day and night, therefore requiring much more equipment for cooling purposes than the proposed Billerica plant, which, as a 340 megawatt "peaker" plant will only be running about 15 percent of the time.

The gas-fired Billerica plant, slated for a 10-acre parcel off Billerica Avenue behind the former D.J. Reardon building, is expected to require no more than a dozen employees and have two to four smokestacks, peeking 50 feet above the tree line, that will be painted green, said DG Clean Power CEO Joseph Fitzpatrick.

"The demand for power increases more every year, as more people buy air conditioners and computers that seem to be running all of the time," said Fitzpatrick. "Peaker plants are vital to keeping the power grid running during critical times."

On an average September day, the power demand for ISO New England is 16,000 megawatts. On Aug. 2, during the height of a summer heat wave, the demand reached 28,000 megawatts.

"The market is looking for the peaker now," said Fitzpatick. "The demand is expected to go past 30,000 megawatts pretty quickly."

It is expected to bring an estimated $1.5 million in revenue to the town through a payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT, to be negotiated between the owner and the town. Additionally, because of the close proximity of the site to the town's wastewater treatment plant, the plant may purchase the discharged gray water from the wastewater facility to be used in the power plant's cooling process.

Fitzpatrick presented an initial proposal to Billerica selectmen on Sept. 18. He expects to file all permits with the state and town by the end of the year, and if all goes well, for construction to begin in the summer of 2007 with a possible opening date of late 2008.

The Bellingham plant, which releases nitrogen oxide into the air at a density of 2 parts per million, is one of the cleanest power plants in the country. In comparison, the Florida Light and Power plant, also in Bellingham, built in the 1980s, emits 25 parts per million when burning gas.

The ANP plant uses a 19 percent ammonia compound to break down the nitrogen oxide in the emissions, making them hundreds of times cleaner than old coal and oil-powered plants.

Emissions are continuously being transmitted to the state Department of Environmental Protection in real time from the plant's control room, which is manned 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

"I would strongly endorse a project like this in any community looking to expand its industrial growth and not just rely on operating on residential property taxes," said Bellingham Town Administrator Denis Fraine, who said the power plant has been a great neighbor.

"It basically has zero impact on the community, but it does provide quite a bit of revenue," he said.

The Maple Street plant contributes about $2.2 million in revenue to the town each year. When the PILOT agreement was locked in, Bellingham began the process of funding a new high school and renovating the middle school.

"We were able to put through a $40 million school project without going to the voters for a debt exclusion," Fraine said.