Hurdles yet to be cleared if Wolverine is to build in Rogers Township
by Richard Lamb– Advance Editor
(Alexandria, Louisiana)– It is good to make plans for the logistics of the construction phase of the $1 billion power plant planned for the Calcite quarry property in Rogers Township, but Craig Borr, Wolverine?s executive vice president, cautioned that all plans are off if Wolverine does not get its air quality permit from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. ?Until and if we get an air permit is really the key to all of this. There are really two keys. We are hopeful the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) will take action on the permit sometime this year. We don?t know that and we have no guarantee of that, but we are optimistic we are going to see some action by the agency this year,? Borr said while in Louisiana with 11 community leaders from Presque Isle County.
?And from our perspective we have to kick it into high gear with regards to our final financial evaluation in terms of sitting down with our members face-to-face and saying what it is going to cost to do this and here are the economic impacts. Is this the right decision or not??
The Advance spoke to him between meetings with government, business, schools and law enforcement in the central Louisiana communities surrounding the nearly-completed power plant the community leaders were visiting last week.
BORR SAID WOLVERINE is still in the development phase, not the decision phase, which comes later. ?We need to be very careful that we do not set the expectation levels of the community too high. Certainly getting an air permit is job number one from our perspective right now.? If that is obtained, Borr said, a detailed financial evaluation would be done as part of the decision phase of the project. If it is the best long-term financial decision to meet the membership?s power supply needs, the board will likely approve the construction, Borr said.
Wolverine is encouraged by what Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm didn?t say in her State of the State address recently. She didn?t come out in favor of new coal plants, but didn?t say she was against them. Cleco?s plan to use a circulating fluidized-bed technology plant, similar to the plan Wolverine intends to use, was applauded on the state and local level in Louisiana. When Cleco CEO Mike Madison announced plans to construct the plant in July 2005, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco stood at his side offering her endorsement.
GOVERNOR GRANHOLM was not present when Wolverine announced its plans in May, 2006 at the Calcite guesthouse and she has not publicly offered an endorsement. Her State of the State message suggested new guidelines. ?What she did say was that the DEQ will consult with the Michigan Public Service Commission with respect to an additional level of due diligence,? Borr told the Presque Isle County delegation while they were in Louisiana. ?From Wolverine?s standpoint, we really do not have any major concerns about that.? He said Wolverine has taken ?due diligence? to a level beyond that suggested by the state.
Borr said a state representative has asked Michigan?s attorney general to rule if the governor had authority to issue an executive order to require additional due diligence. In the buzz, Wolverine plows on, Borr said. ?From our perspective, it means that we continue to keep our heads down and do our work. We have a lot of work to do,? he said.
ALTHOUGH OTHER utilities have taken shots at the governor, Borr said don?t expect to see that from Wolverine. ?You will not see us doing that. It is not our style,? Borr said. Wolverine is well into the permit process while other companies are nearer to the start of the process.
?There was a lot of cross-fire in the media obviously surrounding that issue, but, with all due respect, it doesn?t cause us great concern,? Borr said. A group of 11 community leaders from the county, along with members of the board of directors from Wolverine Power and several Wolverine engineers, visited a power plant in Boyce, Louisiana which Wolverine officials say will be much like the one planned for Presque Isle County. The Shaw Group, a recognized expert in the field of power plant construction, is the contractor for Cleco, the power company in central Louis
Once that has been achieved, the Wolverine Power board of directors will set a vote on the matter of whether to build the plant or not. The board will evaluate information provided including contracts to purchase power from other sources, which expire in 2011.
THE WOLVERINE POWER board of directors consists of two directors from each of the six member organizations. Those cooperatives are Cherryland Electric of Grawn, HomeWorks Tri-County Electric Cooperative of Portland, Spartan Renewable Energy of Cadillac, Great Lakes Energy of Boyne City, Presque Isle Electric and Gas Co-op of Onaway and Wolverine Power Marking Cooperative of Cadillac. Financing must then be secured and a contractor hired. Shaw may have the edge as the preferred contractor, since they are the recognized leader in the industry and have constructed a plant using the circulating fluidized-bed technology Wolverine plans for its Rogers Township plant, but no contracts have been signed. The Wolverine Clean Energy Venture (WCEV) has two components – a base load power plant and a wind turbine farm. The WCEV base load power plant consists of two units at 300 megawatts each.