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Is the O/S unchanged?
If Sean Brungot was so concerned about his daughter he should open an UGMA account and buy LLEG shares and want a new and better life for his family. Maybe he should also marry the mother of his kids instead of just having kids with his girlfriend Jaimie just to show how to be a good role model.
Save powder for .0018
.0018 it will be. just 6 more ticks down
Thank you I picked up a lot of your shares today :)
I bet the MM will try and take it down hard just before the news, just trying to scare and shake loose shares. I am ready for the pullback.
It just looks more professional. Look at all the other big board stocks. they usually say (NYSE:JPM). I do not know why LLEG is in QUOTES "LLEG". . . . Just stating My opinion
LLEG ticker symbol should read (OTC: LLEG.PK) . . . . not (ticker symbol “LLEG”).
OT: I am looking at Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. (LGF)
9 more ticks down to go . . . .
Laidlaw Energy: Berlin, NH
Timeline:
December 15, 2009 – date application submitted
January 15th, 2010 – date application is accepted or denied by the NEW HAMPSHIRE SITE EVALUATION COMMITTEE
September 15th, 2010 – date application is approved or denied.
Fall 2010 – Construction begins (after application approval) The Project construction period is estimated to be 24 to 32 months.
Application of Laidlaw Berlin Biopower, LLC for a Certificate of site and facility for a renewable Energy Facility in Berlin, New Hampshire.
Summary:
• Laidlaw Berlin BioPower, LLC (“LBB”) is proposing to convert and upgrade much of the remaining facility equipment and infrastructure located at the former Fraser Pulp Mill in Berlin, New Hampshire in order to develop a biomass-fueled energy facility.
• LBB will use whole tree wood chips and other low-grade clean wood as fuel, and will be capable of generating up to 70 Megawatts (MW) of electric power.
• The Project’s use of biomass fuel will also help reduce reliance on fossil fuels such as oil and natural gas
• At approximately 70 megawatts in size, the cost of constructing for the Project will be approximately $125 million. (page 99)
Primary Source of Supply:
• An 11 million acre wood basket that is within a 100 mile (3 hour drive) radius of Berlin. According to a fiber study completed by LandVest, Inc. there is ample supply for the Project in excess of current demand
• The Project’s use of this low-grade biomass, harvested in a sustainable manner, will significantly contribute to the health of the surrounding forests. It has been widely acknowledged that
Properly managed and healthy forests are an important tool in fighting global warming through their ability to sequester CO2, a leading greenhouse gas.
Project Components:
• The black liquor recovery boiler currently located at the Site will be converted to a biomass fueled unit. The boiler was manufactured by Babcock & Wilcox (B&W) and originally installed in 1966 and refurbished in 1993
• Development of the overall Facility will also include construction of a new turbine building adjacent to the boiler building, which will house the steam turbine generator
• new cooling tower will be installed near the western edge of the property behind the boiler building
• Two wood fuel off-loading and storage areas will be developed. Each wood handling and storage area will be paved and systems will be installed to properly manage stormwater.
• A rail siding that previously existed on the Site will also be re-constructed to allow for deliveries of wood fuel to the Site
• A new Wood chipping building to produce wood chips from whole logs, will be built on site
• An electric transmission interconnection line will be installed between the site and the existing high voltage transmission line operated by Public Service Company of New Hampshire (PSNH).
• In early December 2009, Laidlaw received the final version of an interconnection feasibility study from the Independent System Operator of the New England (“ISO-NE”) transmission system the entity charged with oversight over the local transmission system. The results indicate that Laidlaw’s project will be able to connect to the transmission system with upgrades estimated to be less than $1 million. The Study takes into account all existing facilities connected to the transmission system in the vicinity of the facility, as well as projects currently under development and ahead of Laidlaw in the ISO-NE queue.
Project Finance:
• At approximately 70 megawatts in size, the cost of constructing for the Project will be approximately $125 million. (page 99)
• $80 million of debt and $30 million of equity
• LBB has entered into a Development Agreement with PJPD Holdings, LLC, whereby PJPD has agreed to provide capital to fund the development of the project until such time as all construction financing is in place.
• The equity capital will be provided by PJPD
• City of Berlin Property tax revenue associated with the biomass facility is anticipated to be in excess of $1 million.
• The Project will sell electricity into the New England power market.
• Terms sheet for Power Purchase agreement with Public Service of New Hampshire (PSNH) (20 year contract to purchase 100% of LLEG's power)
• Berlin Water Works has the adequate water supply and infrastructure to provide Laidlaw Biopower, LLC with up to 1.8 million gallons of water per day
Water Charge $279,736.16
Assessment Charge $505,356.60
Customer Charge $ 2.05
Fire Protection $ 5.00
Quarterly Charge $785,099.81
Hi Matt, hope work is going good. You might want to update the sticky note I modified yesterday. JMO
traders NOT setting there trades as AON, so they get the stupid little trades and pay for it.
With no news we could drop there. Just prepair for the worst and hope for the best. But in the long run we all know where we will be once the permit is approved.
I think we will slowly drop to the low of .0018 set back last month. Just turn off the monitor and stop looking.
From Jon Edwards:
Jonathan Edwards
323 School St.
Berlin, NH 03570
1/5/2010
Via email and US mail
Thomas S. Burack, Chairman
NH Site Evaluation Committee
NH Department of Environmental Services
29 Hazen Drive
Concord, NH 03302
Laidlaw Berlin Biopower
Sec. Docket No. 2009-02
Dear Chairman Burack,
As a PSNH Customer, citizen of Berlin, and business owner within the city of
Berlin, I am concerned related to issues raised recently by Clean Power
Development pertinent to an incomplete application submitted by Laidlaw Berlin
Biopower. It certainly does seem to be appropriate that Laidlaw's application
should be revised or resubmitted so as to address the glaring issues identified
prior to any public hearings. The general public has great need of accurate
information prior to any hearings being held upon which we shall address our
issues and concerns. Of particular concern to me and others who have followed
the Laidlaw development is the history of conflicting press releases now
followed by a filing before your committee with testimony and incomplete
information that seems to be an effort to mislead or otherwise shade the truth.
The following subjects seem to be less than straight forward and therefore
misleading based on the current Laidlaw application.
1.The Landvest study (wood study done for the benefit of Laidlaw to prove ample
supply within a 100 mile radius) neglects to include numerous companies already
using the wood basket nor does it give any consideration of the other potential
users of the biomass. Not only are there other more efficient users proposed for
this same limited resource within New Hampshire but there are a considerable
number of out of state developments that target the same limited fuel supply.
2.Based upon recent testimony to the contrary by a PSNH attorney in an ongoing
docket before the NH Public Utilities Commission 09-067, Laidlaw's contention
that they have a Letter of Intent from PSNH needs to be ascertained as it is
presently not clear that such would be possible. Laidlaw states that a favorable
Purchase Power Agreement is necessary to realize project financing and therefore
without a PPA, or a letter of intent that is substantially the same, is Laidlaw showing
it has the financial capability to construct the project?
3.The Burgess Mill site has a long history of environmental contamination. In
1999 contaminants seeping into the Androscoggin River were of sufficient
quantity that an effort was undertaken to plug the bedrock cracks by injecting
grout. Mercury continued to seep into the river such that 140 pounds was
collected between 1999 and 2006. The site was placed on the National Priorities
List(Superfund) in September 2005. The EPA has been monitoring the river on and
off since then. It is my understanding that EPA is presently investigating the
site. The Laidlaw filing seems to be significantly incomplete as it relates to
the issues and concerns that surround a Brownfield site proposed for
redevelopment. Disturbance of soil and blasting of rock to place new equipment
foundations may be very dangerous as it relates to the fracturing of rock and
the release of more contaminants into the already burdened river. I have concern
for the downstream plant and animal life as well as the environmental risk for
people that may consume fish or drink affected water.
4. Clearly, Laidlaw is not the owner of the Burgess mill site, they are but an
operator/tenant and at best an agent of PJPD holdings, an LLC with unknown
members other than a few officers, with links back to numerous other LLC's of
unknown ownership. It is to the owners of the site and facility that we the
people will seek grievance if there are losses related to environmental damage
to our water and air. Any covenant not to sue between the State of New Hampshire
and the past or future owners of the property should only be related to issues
from the past. If a quantity of contaminants are locked up in this site they
must stay locked up or be properly removed and disposed of. Disturbing the site
so as to cause a release of such contaminants to the environment should lead to
a law suit for damages, and therefore the assets built on the site and the
balance sheet of the owner is of the utmost importance.
5. Laidlaw's potential of producing 40 direct jobs sounds good on the surface. But their
monopoly usage of remaining supply and then an apparent need for further supply can
effectively raise chip price. That could be extremely counterproductive to the north country
economy. Other wood commodity businesses already in operation could easily be forced
out of business due to chip price hikes. Proposals offering higher efficiencies and
synergies can be prevented from going forward due to lack of supply. Though Laidlaw's
claim is that their project will produce 300 indirect jobs within the wood commodities
industry, it is understandable that such a project could easily terminate these indirect jobs
currently being generated by proven entities already in place. The Landvest study clearly
needs to account for all currently operating wood usage in order to fairly balance our
economy moving forward. If biomass plants in Tamworth, Bethlehem, Whitefield, are
forced to close and mucipalities looking to synergize with biomass to heat their
towns and cities can no longer do so, what kind of 2025 initiative is that? What if chip
prices escalate to a point so high that it impacts Fraser papers and becomes the reason
for its closure? What impact would such closures have on area tax base, jobs, and home
grown effieciency? "What ifs"can never be used as a basis for decision making but certainly
need to be carefully looked at in relation to wood supply.
Berlin, in general, seems quite divided on two biomass proposals within the
city, and is basing a great deal of their decision making on potentially
incomplete or inaccurate information. The subject of these biomass facilities
has become the main subject of local newspapers and internet blogs.
Many people within the city feel that politics is too much at play and that
PSNH has too much power within the State for a fair outcome to prevail. I
disagree, and wholeheartedly believe this great State will prevail with what is
in the best interest of our economy, synergy, efficiency, forest sustainability,
and letter of the law. Berlin has been abandoned so many times before by unknown
entities that have liquidated the value of our forest stands, hydros and sold
off the remaining mills for pennies on a dollar, based largely on companies that
left the city in peril, with no one the city could hold accountable. Though it
is possible we have more accountable owners this time around, we the people do
not know who they are. We fear what we do not know and having an untrackable and
untraceable PJPD hiding in the shadows implies that they will also be
unaccountable. Perhaps if we follow the money back to its source we will not
like what we find. I look forward to protection from our state agencies to chart
Berlin into a better future.
Respectfully,
Jonathan Edwards
They have 30 days to accept the application as complete from the Dec 16 2009 file date.
So yes we should get an update around the 15th of January stating the application is FULLY COMPLETE or the application is NOT complete and needs more information. If we need more information we have 10 days to get them there information. Once we are accepted as a complete application THEN an additional 8 months to give us the stamp of approval.
The only thing I can see that is missing from the permit is how much hair John Edwards will lose when he finally realizes he was WRONG.
Matt: I updated your Stocky Note. You might want to update the current sticky note.
Laidlaw regards to the Berlin, NH project
-Terms sheet for Power Purchase agreement with Public Service of New Hampshire PSNH (20 year contract to purchase 100% of LLEG's power)
-Financed $100M for the biomass conversion
-Land and buildings purchased for pennies on the dollar
LLEG HAS filed for their Renewable Energy Facility permit with the NH Site Evaluation Committee on 12/16/2009. The process will take approximately 9 month for approval:
READ THE PERMIT for detailed information: http://www.nhsec.nh.gov/2009-02/documents/091216application.pdf
Once permit is approved, LLEG will be ready to begin construction fall 2010. Construction is scheduled for completion in 2014.
Most are under the impression that the Permitting will go in Laidlaw's favor, considering they are backed by the NH Governor through his 25% by 2025 initiative.
LLEG also has a joint venture with Homeland Renewable Energy, who has Biomass power plants up and running. HRE's plants are fueled by poultry litter, but have 4 projects planned with LLEG for wood burning power plants.
1 of these projects has been announced, a combined Solar/Biomass power plant in New Bedford, MA.
Any questions, please ask!
Part 2 of 2 High-voltage power lines like one in NH could help power the future
By DAVID BROOKS
Staff Writer
Print3 Comments
Staff photo by Don Himsel The high-voltage DC power line is shown running over Route 3A in Litchfield, near the Manchester border.
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editor’s note
This is the second of two stories looking at the state’s electrical grid. Part 1 on Sunday looked at what it will take to keep New England’s electrical grid going. Today’s story focuses on one of the country’s first high-voltage direct-current power lines, which just happens to run through Greater Nashua.
The future of the nation’s power grid – perhaps the world’s power grids – depends on a technology that Nashua area commuters have been driving past for two decades without noticing: High-voltage DC transmission.
“It was a very big project at the time, quite unusual,” said Joe Staszowski of Northeast Utilities, the parent company of Public Service of New Hampshire. “It wasn’t like it was serial No. 1, or anything like that, but it was important for it to work right.”
Fortunately, it has. And if New England’s electric grid is going to enter the 21st century, chances are more lines will be created just like it.
The line in question – parallel cables on huge, two-armed transmission towers – runs for more than 800 miles from James Bay, where Quebec owns huge hydropower plants, through Vermont to tiny Monroe, N.H., at what is known as the Comerford terminal. From there it heads southeast, cutting through Bedford, crossing the Merrimack River at the north end of Litchfield and running down through Pelham into Massachusetts, ending at a power station called Sandy Pond in Ayer, Mass.
The first branch, reaching to Comerford, opened in the mid 1980s, the rest opened in 1990. It is capable of carrying 2,000 megawatts of power, enough for several hundred thousand homes, or almost twice the capacity of Seabrook nuclear power station.
New England is riddled with large power lines, of course. The unique point of this HVDC line is the last two letters in that description: It carries power via direct current (DC), the sort of power used by batteries, rather than the alternating current (AC) that comes out of electrical sockets and which is used throughout most of the power grid.
What’s important about that? Staszowski, who is director of NEPool and ISO relations for Northeast Utilities – ISO oversees new England’s power grid while NEPool is made of participants in the power market – and a member of a state committee considering expansion of transmission lines in Coos County, explained why.
At the atomic level, DC can be thought of as a stream of electrons, AC as a back-and-forth dance of the subatomic particles. At the everyday world level, each method has advantages and disadvantages; when electric power was first being developed a century ago there was a huge fight between inventors Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla over which should prevail. Tesla favored AC and won out.
The development of technologies to handle DC power at very high voltages (roughly equivalent to water under very high pressure) has created a major niche for carrying lots of power very long distances. This is partly because big DC transmission is cheaper to build than complicated AC, and partly because DC power travels with much less loss of energy than AC power.
If you want to send a bunch of megawatts from one place, such as dams in northern Quebec, to another place, such as power-hungry Boston, high-voltage DC is the best way to do it.
Another reason HVDC was used for the line from St. James Bay, says Staszowski, is that DC is forgiving.
“We didn’t have really another option to get power from Quebec because its system has different characteristics than the New England system. You cannot connect an AC line between Quebec and New England and have it work properly – it wouldn’t stay closed, it wouldn’t act well,” he said. “That’s one of the major advantages of DC: if systems aren’t synchronous you need a DC connection to connect the two.”
One scenario being studied for our energy future is tapping into even more hydropower that Quebec wants to build and bringing it south via a 1,200- megawatt HVDC line into New Hampshire, which would connect up with the current AC system somewhere in central or southern New Hampshire.
There is, however, a big disadvantage to HVDC: It is very expensive to convert AC power from generators into DC power and then back into the AC power needed in everyday life. This huge cost means that the electricity can only be “off-loaded” from HVDC lines at a few locations.
“It’s like a very limited access turnpike: only one place to get on and one place to get off. What if you want to get off in the middle? You can’t, or it’s very, very expensive to build another ramp,” Staszowski said.
So HVDC would never be used to, for example, carry power from a small wood-burning power plant to a bunch of customers. But it could be used to haul big loads of power to Chicago or the East Coast from enormous wind farms in the Midwest, or to Beijing from huge solar-power arrays in the Gobi Desert.
Since wind and solar power is often located where people aren’t, such big HVDC lines are likely to become more common around the world. China is planning a score of massive HVDC lines – some three times the size of the St. James line – to carry solar and wind power from western deserts to eastern cities.
But we had it first – well, almost.
David Brooks can be reached at 594-5831 or dbrooks@nashuatelegraph.com
http://www.nashuatelegraph.com/news/515020-196/high-voltage-power-lines-like-one-in-nh.html
Part 1 of 2 High price to keep energy flowing
By DAVID BROOKS
Staff Writer
PrintComment and 30 Reactions
Graphic courtesy of ISO-New England The big source of alternative energy in New England is wind power, but it's usually located far from the cities that use the most power, which means expensive power lines must be built to take advantage of the wind. Offshore wind power is even more powerful than wind onshore, and also carries the need for expensive power line construction. Enlarge
Graphic courtesy ISO-New England This graphic shows work that has been done, and is being considered, to make the regional power grid more reliable. Cost for this work is shared among power customers in all six states. The cost of work to allow transmission of power from alternative energy, such as the proposed improvements to the Coos Loop in northern New Hampshire, would not necessarily be shared. Enlarge
Graphic courtesy of ISO-New England The big source of alternative energy in New England is wind power, but it's usually located far from the cities that use the most power, which means expensive power lines must be built to take advantage of the wind. Offshore wind power is even more powerful than wind onshore, and also carries the need for expensive power line construction.
Enlarge
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first of two stories looking at the state’s electrical grid. Part 2 on Monday will look at one of the country’s few high-voltage direct power lines, which runs through the Nashua region carrying electricity from Quebec, Canada, and is a model for improvements that many say are needed to bring the grid into the 21st century.
Getting electricity from a power plant to a customer seems straightforward enough: String wires on poles and connect each end.
But nothing is straightforward in energy these days, which helps explain why New England’s power grid has moved from being an ignored, 8,000-mile-long mesh to being at the heart of debate about alternative energy and our economic future.
“There’s a lot of public discussion about the transmission grid, which people didn’t seem to focus on in the past. People just flipped the switch and the lights went on,” said Joe Staszowski of Northeast Utilities, the parent company of Public Service of New Hampshire.
“The grid is no longer the invisible thing. People want to hear more about it,” said Gordon van Welie, chief executive officer of ISO-New England, the organization that oversees the power system. “It is part of the president’s speeches and public policy positions. It has been given a national profile.”
It’s about time, too.
New England last had major upgrades to the electricity transmission network a quarter-century ago, when nuclear power plants arrived. Power lines last a long time, but not forever, and their age is showing.
The New England grid is undergoing $4 billion in upgrades, many involving the constructing of high-voltage, 345-kilovolt lines, to keep it functioning. That includes the construction of a new substation in Fitzwilliam and a number of upgrades of 115-kilovolt lines in the Monadnock Region. The cost of this work is distributed equally among all New England electric customers.
Billions more are being proposed to upgrade the regional grid “backbone” and make the grid amenable to alternative energy, which will produce huge debate about who should pay.
Yet, despite all that hardware, there is perhaps no better indication of the complexity of today’s grid than the fact that the most innovative change to New England’s power system in recent years doesn’t involve wires or poles at all – it’s an auction.
Forward Capacity Market
The innovation is called the Forward Capacity Market, which had its first auction nearly two years ago as a way to use market forces to better ensure there’s enough electric production available down the road, and also to give an incentive for using less, as well as producing more.
“It’s like ensuring that you will have a hotel to stay in when the time comes to rent a room,” van Welie said.
This market has been a great success, with on-site site power production or efficiency, known as “demand resource,” accounting for about 10 percent of the total energy use in New England. National forecasts say utilities should shoot for 20 percent.
Basically, ISO forecasts electricity demand three years in advance, then runs a so-called descending clock auction to procure the cheapest capacity that can meet all that need. The payments from the auction cover a portion of the fixed cost, such as the expense of creating a power plant, to help encourage investors to fund electric systems, leaving operating costs to be covered by rate-payers based on costs determined at the actual time the power is needed by ISO.
An existing resource, like a PSNH power plant, gets a partial advance payment for a year while a new resource – a new power station or a guarantee of reduced demand – can lock in payment for longer periods, to encourage their development.
What’s particularly interesting is the reduced-demand guarantee, known as “demand-side resource,” as compared to a “supply-side resource” like a power plant.
“One of the big innovations of the Forward Capacity Market – New England was the first region to have done this – is it will allow demand-side resource to provide capacity on equal footing with supply-side resource,” van Welie said.
He explained it this way: A factory owner might want to invest in new lighting and reduce power use by 20 percent; they can bid that reduction into the market and be paid. That’s a “passive” demand-side resource, a fancy way of saying energy efficiency.
Even better, they might have enough flexibility in their production to be able to shut down a factory on demand, which is called “active” demand-side resource. On a hot day when everybody has turned on the air conditioning (even in New England, the biggest power-usage days occur in the summer), the company can be told to shut the factory or delay operations to reduce overall load. In return for this promise, they get an advance payment.
Another type of active demand-side resource is an on-site power plant at a factory, whether an old-fashioned generator or a bunch of solar panels on the roof. A company can pay for part of that investment by promising to stop using the power when it’s needed in the grid.
“Many customers do that: put in behind-the-meter generation and then pay for at least part of that investment through the capacity market,” van Welie said.
The advantage to the grid is that it reduces the need for more power plants that only get turned on now and then to meet peak demand – such power is vastly more expensive than “baseload” power, which gets generated all the time – and can also reduce the need to build more power lines.
This is an example of what might be called the first iteration of the next-generation power grid. Instead of just pumping out as much power as each user wants whenever they want it, the Forward Capacity Market allows a back-and-forth communication between customers and providers to improve.
This only applies to wholesale customers rather than homeowners, because it’s easier to deal with a small number of large users than hundreds of thousands of houses and apartments.
Making it possible for homeowners to be this flexible will require a move from the old model of power grid as “dumb pipes” to that term that on everybody’s lips from President Obama on down: smart grid.
Smart grid
The problem with making the grid smarter isn’t the wires, it’s the electronic “brains” at each end.
Control centers and homes need to be able to talk back and forth in real time so you can let them know that your rooftop wind turbine is pumping out excess energy for the grid to use, and they can let you know they need your refrigerator to cut back use for an hour this afternoon – or, in a real daydream scenario down the road, both sides can negotiate over who gets to use the energy stored in your electric car’s battery.
The advent of large-scale alternative energy such as the Lempster Mountain Wind Farm or the many, bigger wind farms cropping up in Maine adds to the need for a smart grid. Old-fashioned power plants, fired by oil, natural gas, coal or nuclear power, are dependable, producing power at least 80 percent of the time. Wind farms, on the other hand, generate power less than 33 percent of the time; solar panels are no better.
The grid has to be more flexible to handle these surges.
The first step is smart meters, or upgraded versions of the electric meters on your house.
Current meters only measure how much total power has entered the house. Newer meters can keep track of when the power arrives so utilities can institute “time of day” pricing, charging more for power when demand is high as an encouragement for people to shift their use to down times – running the dishwasher at night, for example – to reduce the need for producing expensive peak-time power.
Hypothetical future versions could connect to hypothetical “smart appliances,” which automatically ramp up or down as needed.
Alas, even time-of-day meters are few and far between these days.
“New England and Alaska have the lowest rate of advanced meters in the country – less than 1 percent,” van Welie said.
On the other hand, he added, smart-meter technology is still in its infancy, so “lagging may not turn out to be a bad thing.
“We’re starting now and we’ll be using the best technology,” he said. “I’m not that troubled by (lack of smart meters).
“The good news story has been we’ve seen this significant growth of demand-response at the wholesale level – in that regard, the New England region is ahead of the rest of the nation,” he said.
Question of cost
The 800-pound gorilla in the room, not surprisingly, is cost.
For example, smart meters cost far more than standard meters. In the Canadian province of Ontario, for example, one estimate is that every customer will pay up to $4 extra each month just to have the meters, and related infrastructure, installed. The hope is that the meters will allow a reduction in use that will save money in the long run, but the initial cost is huge and must be parcelled out somehow.
Then there’s the grid itself: the wires and poles. Everybody wants more alternative energy, but it will require reworking much of the grid.
The old power model involved a relatively small number of big producers relatively near customers – not in cities themselves (that was the 19th-century model) but often in the same county or portion of the state. Over the years, large and intermediate connections have been built with this in mind, rather like interstate highways connecting cities, with major arterial roads branching off.
Alternative energy – wind farms, hydropower dams, the open space needed for large solar farms – must usually be placed in remote places where there aren’t enough power lines to carry all the power they produce.
For example, PSNH’s parent company, Northeastern Utilities, is talking with Hydro Quebec about jointly building a 1,200-megawatt power line that would run to southern New Hampshire from hydropower plants up near Hudson Bay.
ISO-New England has developed a some rough ideas for expanding the regional backbone to make it easier to shift power around from alternative energy at remote sites.
Cost estimates start at $3.5 billion and move up to $25 billion – sums that would give anybody pause.
The transmission issue is already hurting alternative energy, stalling the development of wind farms and wood-burning power plants north of the Notches. Perhaps $100 million or so of upgrades are needed to the Coos Loop, a portion of the grid connecting Coos County to southern New Hampshire, so that enough electricity could be shipped south to justify the construction of the new power plants.
The question is: Who should pay that bill?
“If you upgrade the loop, should the generators pay, should North Country folks pay, should New Hampshire customers pay, should New England customers pay?” said PSNH’s Staszowski. “This question – who pays? – is not only local and regional, but national.”
For example, some of the best wind power in the U.S. exists in the upper Midwest, which is empty and flat enough to make huge wind farms feasible.
Bringing that power to New York and New England could cost as much as $150 billion in new transmission lines.
It could offset billions of dollars’ worth of imported oil and new power plants, not to mention helping cut pollution, but there’s still the up-front cost to parcel out.
“If they produce tens of thousands (of megawatts) of wind in the Dakotas and want to ship it to the East Coast and the South, they need to build big transmission lines. Who should pay?” Staszowski said. “There’s really a big national debate on who will pay for transmission and who are the real beneficiaries of it.”
Many questions
The recession has reduced electricity consumption, trimming the price of fossil fuels, which has made the complicated question of cost even more complicated.
“That made it much harder to economically justify renewable-energy projects – it’s a harder justification than it was 12-18 months ago,” van Welie said. “Some of the transmission investment is also being re-examined.”
This reflects the new reality, he said: Even as more attention is being devoted to the grid, more people realize what it can make possible.
“There are lots of possibilities,” he said at a recent gathering of the New Hampshire Business and Industry Association.
“The question is, how far do we want to go and what makes economic sense?”
David Brooks can be reached at 594-5831 or dbrooks@nashuatelegraph.com
http://www.nashuatelegraph.com/news/statenewengland/513264-227/high-price-to-keep-energy-flowing.html
Sounds like UPOD to me . . . We will all be happy in this new wonderful year.
HAPPPY 2010 everyone
Open a UGMA account today and start saving for your kids future.
I just opened up a UGMA (Uniform Gifts to Minors Act)for both of my kids 9 and 7. I will be adding a lot of LLEG into there accounts to pay of college.
If you have kids you MUST open a UGMA with a brokerage account, not a bank.
....JMO
HAPPY NEW YEAR ALL
Parity in the Production Tax Credit
By Bob Cleaves
The Biomass Power Association recently addressed government officials and other renewable energy industry representatives at a Biopower Workshop in Denver, sponsored by the U.S. DOE. The focus of the workshop was to understand the developing trends in the bioenergy field in order to help the DOE focus its efforts on the research and development that would produce the best results.
Former BPA Chairman Bill Carlson made a compelling case for the importance of analyzing the optimal cost/benefit relationship between the location and size of traditional wood waste biomass power plants. His complete study “Bigger Not Necessarily Better or Cheaper,” can be found at http://smallwoodnews.com/Docs/PDF/Supply/BIOMASS%20POWER%20AS%20A%20FIRM%20UTILITY%20RESOURCE.pdf.
My presentation focused on steps that Congress could take now, irrespective of research and development, to expand the role of biomass power in America and allow all renewable energy sources to operate on a level playing field.
Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, wood-fired biomass power plants were awarded half the production tax credit that other renewable energy sources such as wind and geothermal power received. What’s worse, the tax credit was also awarded for half the time period, which is why BPA is currently fighting to get those production tax credits extended for an additional five years.
The disparity in the credit, however, does not stop with wind and geothermal power. As demonstrated in the table below, biomass power receives only $2.93 per kilowatt hour. When compared with ethanol, cellulosic ethanol, biodiesel, wind, geothermal and advanced nuclear power, wood-fired biomass power plants receive the least support, by a long shot. There is no legitimate policy explanation for this disparity.
The table details the standard dollar amounts awarded to different renewable energy sources per million Btu generated. In other words, all of those renewable sources are calculated on the same scale. There is no difference in the quality of energy produced, just in some cases the type of energy; fuel versus electricity. Considering the economic and environmental benefits of biomass power, it is inexcusable that it would receive less support than its competitors.
The BPA is urging Congress to level the playing field in the renewable sector by giving biomass power the same tax credits as other renewable energy sources. Congress must provide tax equity, or parity, in the production tax credit. No one should be picking winners and losers in the renewable energy industry.
Without parity, biomass power is at a competitive disadvantage. Additionally, this discourages the expansion of biomass power and undermines America’s goals of meeting an aggressive renewable electricity standard. To protect and grow the biomass industry, tax equity is essential.
The value of a penny may seem inconsequential, even in today’s weakened economy, but to a biomass power producer it can mean the difference between keeping the lights on and going dark. BIO
Bob Cleaves is president and CEO of the Biomass Power Association. To learn more about biomass power, please visit www.USABiomass.org.
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/article.jsp?article_id=3381
NC utility seeks more for electricity from woody biomass
By Lisa Gibson
Progress Energy Carolinas wants to add between 40 to 75 megawatts (MW) of biomass-based electricity to its capacity, starting in 2013. The utility accepted proposals for electricity generated from woody biomass through Dec. 15 as it looks to contribute to North Carolina’s renewable portfolio standard of 12.5 percent by 2020, according to Scott Sutton, Progress Energy communication specialist. The company was looking for proposals from engineers and developers, who will build, own and operate their own facilities, but with purchase agreements in place with Progress for 100 percent of the power generated, renewable energy certificates and the biomass facility’s capacity, Sutton said. Utilities need to guarantee to their overseers that they have enough capacity to provide power to their customers whenever it’s needed and purchasing the biomass facility’s capacity would allow Progress to count it toward its own capacity, he explained. The proposed facilities must be in North Carolina and run on woody biomass only.
Progress did not specify that all the energy needs to come from one plant, Sutton said, leaving the possibility of more than one contract with more than one developer. Bids were to go through a competitive bidding process and contracts would include timelines for construction and operation. Progress was expected to screen and evaluate proposals by Jan. 10 and a short-list determination, if necessary, was scheduled for Jan. 11, according to the company. Contract negotiations should be completed by Feb 14. The company has not ruled out building its own biomass plant, if the economics are better than simply purchasing power.
The company does not own any biomass power plants, but has about 300 MW under contract, although not all are operating currently, Sutton said. Most of Progress’s biomass energy is generated in Florida—280 MW from wood waste and sweet sorghum—among other biomass feedstocks. The company also purchases power from a 25 MW plant in North Carolina that runs on wood waste, along with a 7 MW plant that uses municipal solid waste. Sutton said Progress has considered converting its existing coal-fired plants to biomass feedstock to increase its renewable energy resources.
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/article.jsp?article_id=3367
purplemountain is right. it seems geared to other formes of renewables like biodiesel from organic slime (algea)
Day 8 of 30 for the SEC to review the application and accept it as complete or to reject it.......
House votes to restore loan guarantee funding
By Erin Voegele
Report posted December 23, 2009, at 9:14 a.m. CST
On Dec. 16, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to pass legislation that would restore $2 billion in funding to a U.S. DOE loan guarantee program created to fund new technologies to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The funding was borrowed from the program in July 2009, and used to extend the Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save Program–more commonly known as Cash for Clunkers.
In response to the legislation, the Renewable Fuels Association said it was pleased to see the House vote to return those funds. “It’s an important step and one the Senate should replicate as soon as possible,” RFA President Bob Dinneen said. “Restoring these funds is just the first step. Making sure the shovel-ready advanced biofuel projects can gain access to these loan guarantees is vital for them to begin construction and production commercial volumes of next generation renewable fuels.”
The RFA also pointed out that it is the responsibility of the Obama Administration to ensure that this funding is spent on a program that will meet the nation’s energy, economic and environmental goals, and said the administration is lagging behind on initiatives that could be helping to reduce U.S. GHG emissions today.
According to the RFA, the DOE’s loan guarantee program is flawed in that it weighs the applications of emerging technology projects, such as cellulosic ethanol, using the same criteria used to evaluate more mature technologies, such as wind and solar. In a letter sent to the DOE in October, the RFA said that the challenges facing next generation biofuels are much different than the challenges facing the renewable power sector.
On Dec. 15, Vice President Joe Biden issued a memo to President Barack Obama that outlined the energy progress and goals of the administration. In that memo, Biden said that through the Recovery Act and the more effective use of programs already in existence, the administration is taking the steps to transform the U.S. into a global clean energy leader.
According to the memo, the energy components of the Recovery Act represent the largest single investment in clean energy in American history. The act’s investment of $80 billion for clean energy could produce as much as $150 billion in clean energy projects, while existing investment programs could produce up to $90 billion in additional clean energy projects. In the memo, Biden states that these investments are jump-starting a transformation in our energy system, including unprecedented grown in advanced vehicle and fuel technologies.
The memo states that Recovery Act investments will provide the next generation of biofuels. “Over $600 million in Recovery Act grants – expected to be matched more than dollar for dollar by private funds – along with federal loan guarantees, will support 19 pilot, demonstration, and commercial-scale biorefineries,” said Biden in the memo. “These facilities will convert various forms of biomass into fuels and chemicals that otherwise would be produced from oil, while creating jobs and raising farm incomes in rural communities across the U.S. Before these investments, the development of an advanced biofuels industry was at a virtual standstill as numerous facilities at the pilot stage had faltered during the economic downturn as credit markets tightened.”
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/article.jsp?article_id=3346
Cannot have a stock buyback without revenues. Cannot do a buyback with debt.
you can only deposit $5,000 cash (NO STOCK) per year in your Roth...post tax money.
You still need to pay taxes on your 401K.
INTERESTING....Wood-drying system available soon in US
By Lisa Gibson
Posted December 21, 2009, at 2:37 p.m. CST
A wood-drying system that has been used in Japan for the past five years will be available in the U.S. market in early 2010.
Greenstone Holdings Inc.’s Green-Dri system was developed from a biotechnological concept based on Toshio Ito’s Nobel Prize-winning Bound Water Transfer Theory, according to the company. Ito, a professor at John’s Hopkins University School of Medicine, discovered channels that regulate and facilitate water molecule transport through cell membranes.
Wood and its cells survive and function as a living organism after it is cut and the Green-Dri system uses that natural characteristic to “sweat out” water through the channels without damaging the cells, according to the company. The system allows for lower temperatures and less energy than conventional kilns, while shortening the drying time.
The sauna-like structures have double-layer walls, ceilings and floors made out of wood. The wood construction is a key element to the process and because of a constant temperature setting, no scheduling is necessary and mixtures of different species and sizes of wood can be dried at the same time. Systems can range in size from 5-feet-long, 5-feet-wide and 5-feet-tall, to 100-feet-long, 20-feet-wide and 20-feet-tall, according to Sal Miwa, Greenstone CEO. Costs can be anywhere from $3,000 to more than $200,000, he added. The operating cost, however, is about 10 percent that of conventional drying kilns. “Our test unit, which has 2,000-board-feet capacity, cost only $17 for electricity cost for one month,” he said. “A major part of saw mill cost and energy consumption is drying process, so we would be saving lots of energy.”
The kilns come with sliding or swinging doors and feature a small entry for inspections. A protective housing is available for use in colder regions and the system can be fit for loading via forklift or rail track. The target markets for the product are saw mills, lumber yards, and manufacturers of sporting equipment, musical instruments, furniture, cabinets and others, Miwa said.
More than 30 units have been sold in Japan so far. Japan’s Imperial Housing Agency approved specified usage of wood dried by Green-Dri for the new earthquake-proof Central Cultural Center at Todaiji Temple in Nara, Miwa said. The wooden Buddhist temple, also the largest wooden building in the world, dates back to 782.
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/article.jsp?article_id=3343
since the Permit states :
d. Unit efficiency
Based on the annual average heat input rate provided by B&W at a fuel moisture content of 37.6% (932 MMBtu/hr) and a gross power output of 70 MW, the Facility will have a gross heat rate of approximately 13,300 Btu/kWh. This equates to a fuel to gross power output efficiency of approximately 25%. This efficiency will vary to some degree with fuel moisturecontent, as added heat input is required to vaporize water contained in fuels with higher moisture content than the design fuel. The efficiency may be further improved during more detailed design engineering.
The question:
Can we buy one of these and reduce the moisture enough to improve the efficiency of the plant? When the time comes to look at engineering regarding wood-drying. I think issuing shares to pay for this improvement might be worth it in the long run......Just My Opinion. . . . lets be the first to use one here in the USA.
Once we get revenues no reason to do baby steps. It will only cost more money. Straight onto NASDAQ. But not till 2013 or 2014.
Just enjoy the quietness; people are scared of the Pink sheet stocks making LLEG more affordable to you.
Bill Gates dropped out of college. I bet you wish you invested big buckes in that small microsoft stock .
59.5 years old to retire. some people wish they can retire before 60 but can not. and just imagin knowing when you are in your 20's, 30's, 40's (me 35) that you are set for retirement. What a great feeling that must be. You know on your 59th birthday it is time to resign and enjoy life. I wish my dad got a chance to retire he dies at 57 and he worried like everyone else.
Plus you can not count on the Social Security, By the time we are set to retire there will be no money.
I agree you should post something about estimates because you know it will come up over and over again WHAT IS LLEG WORTH?
BUT
I do not want you to post anything because I do not want people to know about LLEG yet and I want to buy all the shares... is that greedy of me
UPOD is when a CEO underestimates his earnings and earning potential then beats the numbers when it is time to release his numbers. Unexpected good news is what the stock market wants.
Even though LLEG is not traded on the big board YET...The same scenario works on new and potential investment projects for LLEG.
If you bought LLEG because of the two MA projects, and the projects fell through before they could be inked (signed) you would be inclined to sell. BUT if you did not know about the MA projects and a PR just popped up stating we now have two new projects inked in MA and here are the details, it will cause the stock to go up and anyone shorting to lose their head.
Shorts attack a stock that has bad history of missing numbers or missed timelines.
P/S Make sure you have LLEG in a RothIRA....
There will be some scheduled downtime. I cant remember the page 20 - 40.
Who knows what the REC value will be in 2013. Lets start asking that question in 2012.
You need to do all calculations based on 3billion A/S FULL DILUTION. Why do calculations on a figure that can change.
Thank You . . . You have proven yourself once again. After going through the permit I can see why it took so long to prepare. I can see how timelines had to be lengthened to obtain all the critical and detailed required information.
I am sure there are no doubters in Laidlaw anymore.
I for one will be purchasing a lot more LLEG stock, unless you want to sell me some of your perfered. My only comment is please do not give timelines. Also UPOD ;) it will help stabilize the stock price from dramatic price swings. it will also prove that LLEG should not be shorted.
I thank you again, and have a great holiday my friend.
Bill E.
Dividends will not be thought of until atleast the next 10 - 15 years. BUT MATT this is why you opened your RothIRA. You will retire nicely in 15 - 20 years from now. and TAX FREE.
Hope your test went well
Stay warm my friends