Concerns Raised About Vermont Biomass Incinerator Traffic

Con­cerns Raised About Ver­mont Bio­mass Incin­er­a­tor Traffic

Novem­ber 13, 2013, Source: AP

A hear­ing offi­cer for Vermont’s util­i­ty reg­u­lat­ing Pub­lic Ser­vice Board has rec­om­mend­ed that a state cer­tifi­cate of pub­lic good not be grant­ed to a pro­posed bio­mass ener­gy plant in North Spring­field because the project would cre­ate too much truck traffic.

In a doc­u­ment filed Fri­day, board hear­ing offi­cer John Cot­ter said that truck traf­fic to and from the plant would have an undue impact on the com­mu­ni­ty and its nar­row streets.

‘‘I am cog­nizant of the fact that the project would pro­vide mea­sur­able ben­e­fits to the sur­round­ing com­mu­ni­ty and the state as a whole if it were con­struct­ed and oper­at­ed,’’ Cot­ter wrote. ‘‘I can­not con­clude that there are rea­son­able con­di­tions that could be imposed to alle­vi­ate the undue impacts of the sig­nif­i­cant increase in truck traf­fic on two local streets lead­ing to the entrance of the North Spring­field Indus­tri­al Park.’’

The North Spring­field Sus­tain­able Ener­gy Project hopes to build a 37-megawatt wood-fired pow­er plant in the North Spring­field Indus­tri­al Park. Wood chips would be trucked to the project and ear­li­er this year, the town of Spring­field entered into an agree­ment with the devel­op­ers for the con­struc­tion of a new access road to the plant.

The project would also pro­duce low-cost steam heat for the busi­ness­es in the indus­tri­al park, as well as a ther­mal loop for res­i­dences in an area of North Springfield.

Near­by res­i­dents claim the project would be a blight on the land­scape and pump tons of tox­ic pol­lu­tants and par­tic­u­late into the atmosphere.

Inter­est­ed par­ties have until the end of Novem­ber to com­ment before the board makes a final decision.