Hearing set on biomass proposals
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
By STAN FREEMAN
sfreeman@repub.com
HOLYOKE - With critical questions about the environmental impact of wood-burning power plants still unanswered, the energy and forestry experts who will try to answer those questions for the state will hold a public hearing Thursday to discuss their study.
The hearing, set for 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Holiday Inn on Whiting Farms Road in Holyoke, will be held to outline the six-month study and to solicit input from the public.
In November, the state Department of Energy Resources commissioned the Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences in Plymouth to conduct the study. The team that has been assembled to perform the study includes representatives of the Pinchot Institute for Conservation, the Forest Guild and the Biomass Energy Resource Center as well as independent forest ecologists and resource economists.
Wood-burning power plants were being fast-tracked by the state as a way to reduce dependence on foreign oil and fossil fuels generally. However, questions have emerged about how many plants Massachusetts forests can sustainably support and how wood harvesting should be conducted so that the plants minimize their contributions to global warming.
Three industrial-scale wood-burning power plants have been proposed for the Pioneer Valley in Springfield, Russell and Greenfield. The plants in Russell and Greenfield plan to burn "clean wood," generally wood scraps and cut wood from logging operations. The plant in Springfield had planned to burn construction and demolition debris as well as some clean wood.
Last week, the state suspended the review of permit applications for facilities proposing to burn construction and demolition debris to create energy, until an environmental impact assessment is completed.
Two weeks ago, the state suspended consideration of applications by biomass plants for renewable energy credits, which are considered critical to the financing of the plants, until the Manomet study is completed. That decision affected the plants in Russell and Greenfield. Developers of the plant in Springfield have not applied for the credits.
The Manomet study is likely to lead to new standards and regulations that the biomass plants must meet in order to be considered sources of renewable energy. The study is also likely to say how many tons of wood can be safely taken from Massachusetts forests, and therefore how many plants the state can support.
