In the Southwest New Hampshire town of Hinsdale, battle lines are being drawn over a proposed power plant.
Like the proposed BioEnergy plant in Hopkinton, the Hinsdale facility would burn construction and demolition debris.
The Keene Sentinel's Donna Moxley reports.
The Needham, Massachusetts-based GenPower wants to build its biomass power plant just across the Connecticut River from the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant.
50% of the plant's fuel would come from wood chips and sawdust.
The rest would come from construction and demolition debris - known as C and D.
That wood would come from sites in New Hampshire and elsewhere.
But a new group - Concerned Citizens of Hinsdale - has cropped up to fight the power plant.
Their main concern is pollution from heavy metals and other toxins.
Alman
1:16 Anybody can say, well our scrubbers and pollution devices will work, but even if a small bit escapes that's still too much. 1:25
Dorianne Alman is one of four founding members of the group.
Alman
2:56 Monument Road is a residential community. People walk their dogs on that road, they jog on that road, children stand by the roadside waiting for the school bus ... a facility of this size does not belong in a neighborhood. 3:12
GenPower's Project Manager Ken Milne says the company chose Hinsdale because it is close to good highways and a power transmission line.
It's also close to Massachusetts where the company plans to sell much of its energy.
The Bay state requires utilities buy part of their electricity from plants that use renewable resources.
What's more, says Milne, the plant would help Hinsdale's economy.
Milnee
22:39 It brings a lot of benefits to the town - it brings employment, it brings taxes, real estate taxes. The construction period is 18-20 months, it brings a lot of workers in, during that period they'll be buying a lot of gas and food ...
But Dorianne Alman, with Concerned Citizens says she doesn't expect to see her own tax bill shrink when the plant goes online.
Alman
I have yet to see any municipality lower the taxes of its residents ... the town will spend that on other projects and we will not see any tax relief. 4:16
Despite the opposition from some locals, GenPower's argument hasn't fallen completely on deaf ears.
Sandy Golden lives in a double-wide trailer that's recently been assessed at ninety thousand dollars.
She says the taxes on her home and two acres of property add up to twenty six hundred dollars a year.
Golden looks at the power plant as a potential source of relief.
Golden
36:47 I know that when towns get large businesses that come in, and they're going to pump in a lot of tax revenue, that does tend to lower the tax burden on everyone else. I mean, a million dollars in tax money is a lot more than I can pay the town of Hinsdale.
Golden thinks federal and state environmental regulations will keep pollution to a minimum.
Golden
38:29 There are no mass graves of people who've died living near these things.
GenPower's Ken Milne could not agree more.
He says state and federal requirements keep such facilities from operating in a dangerous manner, or spewing unsafe levels of toxins.
Milnee
24:10 power plants are very heavily regulated in the design and construction phase and the operation phase as well ...
27:09 We're going to comply with all the federal and state regulations that tell us what the limits are in terms of what we can emit into the atmosphere, and they're pretty stringent and they're going to become more stringent as new technology comes online. 27:30
But that's what GenPower told West Virginia voters when it wanted to build a power plant in that state.
But as the Keene Sentinel reported last weekend, it wasn't until local environmental groups took GenPower to court that the company cleaned up its facitility near Morgantown West Virginia.
In addition, GenPower agreed to pay millions of dollars to help reduce acid rain and greenhouse gas emissions.
Hinsdale residents aren't the only ones concerned about the proposal.
The neighboring town of Winchester has sent a letter to Hinsdale officials expressing some worries.
But Ken Milne with Gen Power says those expressions of concern are typical.
23:24 Believe me, that happens in every single power project or in fact industrial project of any size ... power plants, there's a, I think, because of coal plants and you know problems with nuclear plants there's just a general aura about power plants being a problem. 23:45
GenPowers plans face a public hearing Wednesday at Hinsdale High School.
The meeting is scheduled to begin at 7.
For NHPR News, this is Donna Moxley.
