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Albany -- Company behind Glenville project says it will know in 30 days whether to proceed
The company that wants to build a power plant in Glenville will "put up or shut up" in the next 30 days.
Glenville Energy Park LLC will have the cash to get through the approval process or will withdraw its application, said Jeffrey Cohen, attorney for GEP, drawing quiet gasps at a hearing Tuesday in Albany.
"We are still confident that we will get that money," Cohen said.
The plant was first proposed in 1999. In the years since, financial backers have pulled out and the project has stalled.
The company also said it would provide at least $100,000 in technical assistance money for groups affected by the project. And, if GEP gets its financing, it will pay the $109,000 it owes the town of Glenville for studies related to the plant.
During a four-hour hearing at the office of the state Public Service Commission, opponents of the plant, including local municipalities, a grass-roots group and individual residents, argued against the company and its plan.
"How many bites of the apple do they get?" asked Daniel Hill, a Schenectady resident who owns land near the plant. His motion asking that GEP's application be tossed prompted the hearing.
The natural gas-fired plant would produce 520 megawatts of electricity, or enough to power more than 500,000 homes. It would be on 22 acres in the Scotia-Glenville Industrial Park off Route 5, a half-mile from the Mohawk River.
GEP has hit snags besides financing: the city of Schenectady has refused to provide a water source and the village of Scotia has denied the plant a sewage link. As a result, the company has to change its siting application. It also may have to do new studies because the original work is now outdated, and standards and conditions have changed.
Opponents said so much needs to be changed that GEP should have to start anew.
That could make things even more difficult for the company. The state law under which it made its application, Article 10, was meant to expedite power-plant siting, but expired in 2002.
Opponents say the project has seen too many delays and missed deadlines. They contend the information GEP provided Tuesday is too vague.
"All that we've had from the applicant this morning is a string of maybes at a time when there should be certainties," said David Engel, the attorney for Scotia.
The company proposed an "open book" permit process, under which it would share environmental samples and involve the public in studies at an early stage, GEP attorney Cohen said.
He would not reveal the identity of potential investors, but said they were not interested in building or operating the plant. He declined to pinpoint the land where the company wants to drill wells to get water to cool power-generating equipment, or reveal where on the Mohawk River it wants to discharge the water.
The hearing covered many issues, including effects on real estate prices and how attorney's fees burdened residents.
"This is a complex question," said J. Michael Harrison, administrative law judge for the PSC, and one of two judges overseeing the process.
The judges said they would rule on Hill's motion, and parties could file briefs in response.
"Enron," said Thomas Macaulay, a principal in GEP and former Vermont state senator, when asked why it was taking so long. "The Enron scandal. The whole industry has been having a difficult time."
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