Maine news, sports, weather | Kennebec Journal, Augusta, Maine

Hydroelectric may come to Gardiner

New Mills Dam potential site of small power plant

By Mechele Cooper mcooper@centralmaine.com
Staff Writer

GARDINER -- City officials are considering the potential benefits of a small hydroelectric power plant at the New Mills Dam.

New Mills Dam is owned by Gardiner, Litchfield and Richmond; the pump station and equipment belong to the Gardiner Water District.

Last Wednesday, the water district Board of Trustees and city officials met with Abigail Parker, a representative of Osprey LLC, to discuss the potential.

"We're trying to get it back to energy generation," Parker said of the New Mills Dam site on Cobbosseecontee Stream that includes an old pump station. "We're still in the very early planning process and have met with the Water District trustees, the owner of the power station and turbine equipment, but nothing was decided. We discussed some options, but nothing concrete."

City Manager Scott Morelli said the city would benefit in two ways: If Osprey used the dam for power generation, he said the liability would shift to that company; the city would no longer have to insure or maintain the property and could gain an annual percentage of the net sale of electricity.

Osprey is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Phoenix Renewable Energy, an affiliate of Woolwich-based general contractor Reed & Reed Inc., which has erected windmills across New England.

The proposed project would consist of "an existing 12-foot-high, 91-foot-wide concrete dam with a 58-feett-wide spillway; an existing 140-acre reservoir; an existing powerhouse penstock and outlet structure; new turbine generator units with a total installed capacity of 250 kilowatts; a new transmission line connecting to an existing Central Maine Power distribution line located 3,000 feet downstream of the dam; and appurtenant facilities."

The project could produce an average annual generation of about 1,300 megawatt-hours that could be sold directly to a local utility, according to the company's estimates.

"They haven't made any sort of an offer or anything like that," Morelli said Monday. "They want to meet with the communities that have an intermunicipal agreement to maintain the dam."

Gardiner Water District Superintendent Paul Gray said the water district Board of Trustees loved the idea. He said the water district had looked into a hydroelectric project before, but decided it was too expensive.

There are a number of small electric-generating sites around the state.

"I'd like to see something done with this dam and old building," Gray said. "It's a little piece of Gardiner history. They're going to come back with a more detailed proposal and the board is going to look at it seriously."

Gray said Osprey could either lease or purchase the site.

Osprey only wants to use a small portion of the old brick pump station, he said: a 16-feet-by-24-feet section that houses the generation equipment on the stream side.

"We would like to find a way to restore that building so it could stay up for another 100 years," Gray said. "But this is pretty early in the process. When they come back we'll make a decision. We're shooting to meet with them again at the November meeting."

He said board meetings are 5:30 p.m. the second Wednesday of every month in the water district's office at 46 Water St.

Mechele Cooper -- 623-3811, ext. 408

mcooper@centralmaine.com