After a fairly calm public hearing Tuesday night, Alpine Energy Group representatives received an altogether different reception at Wednesday morning’s Senate hearing, where they were met by a group of residents strongly opposed to the company’s proposed waste-to-energy facilities on St. Thomas and St. Croix.
Public testifiers at Wednesday’s Economic Development, Energy and Technology Committee meeting brought along documents, slide shows and even containers of pet coke they said would illustrate what kind of damage the facilities would inflict upon the local community.
Those opposed to the project want V.I. lawmakers to deny the lease for land that would house the company’s facility on St. Thomas or at least table the lease until the project can be further analyzed.
Alpine has proposed burning refuse-derived fuel (RDF)—or pelletized trash—and pet coke to create energy, which would then be sold to the Water and Power Authority at fixed rates set for the next 20 years. Many of the public testifiers Wednesday said pet coke was dirty, worried about what kind of residue would come out of the facility’s stack, and whether it would negatively impact their health.
These concerns have been aired at several public, Senate and Public Services Commission hearings held over the past few months—ever since WAPA and the Waste Management Authority announced last August that Alpine had emerged as the winner of WAPA’s 20-month-long quest for a local alternative energy provider.
What did not come up until Wednesday’s Senate hearing were allegations from three public testifiers that WAPA had started negotiations with Alpine before the bidding process was over—allegations which several senators said needed to be supported by "facts" and not just "opinion."
Wednesday’s Senate hearing comes after several senators, headed by the committee’s chairman Sen. Craig W. Barshinger, recently took a field trip to study the operations of a pet coke plant in Jacksonville, Fla.
Barshinger said Wednesday he was "impressed" by what he saw. "This technology, when it’s done right, is probably not as evil as we’ve made it out to be," he said.
Alpine executives have explained that the residual ash from the facility is not like coal ash, but rather more like cement powder. That material will be scooped up internally by a vacuum system, which will keep the ash from flying out of the facility’s stack and coating any nearby residences, said Donald Hurd, Alpine’s executive vice president.
Still, many residents said they were concerned that more pet coke than trash would be burned, and whether any of the other fuels proposed by project representatives — such as woody biomass, scrap tires and sludge — would create a bad mix, resulting in harmful emissions.
"We need to know, once you put this brew together and concoct your formula, what will be the impact," said Clarence Payne, head of the Bovoni Homeowners Association. "We don’t know. And we don’t want to be experimented on in the Virgin Islands."
While WAPA and Alpine officials have said emissions are well below standards set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, they stressed Wednesday that the project would not even be able to get off the ground if anything hazardous is produced.
Meanwhile, using alternate fuels such as scrap tires would mean using less pet coke, and there is a possibility — depending on how much trash is available — that the plant could possibly run without it somewhere down the line, Hurd said after the meeting.
"The reason why we’re using pet coke and RDF [refuse-derived fuel] now is because we have a certain supply," he added. "But if there is a substantial amount of these variable sources of fuel, our facility can accommodate that. And if it’s available, then we will."
Alpine President James Beach has also discussed getting local residents and businesses to supply the alternate fuel source — or what executives have called "opportunity fuels" — and working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture on a program that would grow crops that could be used in the facilities’ burners.
Where the facilities will be located was also an issue Wednesday for environmentalists, who said the site on St. Thomas near the Bovoni dump will wreak havoc on the plant life in the area and marine habitats at nearby Stalley Bay.
The Bovoni site, according to Alpine’s documents, is expected to be "cleared" and "leveled" to make way for the plant, said local environmentalist Helen Gjessing. Offshore sea grass beds and unique habitats — some frequented by turtles — will be eradicated if those plans move ahead, she added.
Hurd said later the company hasn’t finalized the construction plans, which may include the use of explosives in the demolition process.
"We will work to minimize the amount of property that’s cleared flat, but really, we’re a long way from finalizing anything," he said.
Wednesday’s hearing wrapped around 7:30 p.m., with Barshinger saying that a similar hearing will be planned for St. Croix.
On the big island, the waste-to-energy facility would be located on the Northern Marietta Channel, on St. Croix’s south shore. The lease for land on which the facility will be housed must be approved by the V.I. Port Authority.
The third in a series of public meetings, hosted by WMA, WAPA and Alpine to discuss the project, will be held Thursday on St. John at the legislative building from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Present during Wednesday’s meeting were Barshinger, along with Sens. Louis P. Hill, Neville James, Nereida Rivera-O’Reilly, Sammuel Sanes, Patrick Simeon Sprauve and Michael Thurland.
