City and state officials joined with top Coast Guard brass to break ground Tuesday on a new landfill gas co-generation plant at the Coast Guard?s Baltimore yard, which they said would meet all of the facility?s power needs with a renewable energy source.
The project will capture methane gas, a natural byproduct of waste decomposition, at the nearby Quarantine Road landfill and convert it into bioenergy.
The plant is the largest renewable energy project in Coast Guard history and the first of its kind in Maryland.
“If it?s successful, we could build on this,” Mayor Sheila Dixon said. “Beyond the Coast Guard, this is something we can do for the city to bring green energy to our buildings.”
The $41 million project includes a $14 million, 5,000-square-foot facility at the yard, built by Knoxville, Tenn.,-based contractor Ameresco, which also will staff and operate the plant.
Under an agreement with the Coast Guard, the city will build a collection system at the landfill at a cost of $2 million. The Coast Guard will reimburse those construction costs in the first two years of the plant?s operation, and buy the methane gas from the city at a cost of $200,000 annually for up to 15 years.
The yard, located outside Dundalk, is the Coast Guard?s only shipbuilding and repair facility. The yard operates on a $60 million annual budget and employs 623 civilians and 94 military personnel on 112 acres. As the Coast Guard?s largest industrial plant, the new project would make the facility more resilient to attack by isolating it from the main power grid.
“This project is very, very promising for what it says about our strengths,” Gov. Martin O?Malley said at the groundbreaking. “Today ? we?re celebrating not just a more integrated defense, but a more sustainable future.”
Once operational the plant will meet all of the yard?s energy needs, provide surplus energy to the city and also will be totally independent of the traditional power grid, said yard commanding officer Capt. Stephen Duca. The latter feature also boosts the Coast Guard?s ability to help in the event of a local disaster, Duca said.
“We have emergency generators here, but we?ll also have this source of energy operating at full capacity,” he said.
Once the facility is paid off, Duca said the yard?s only energy cost would be purchasing the landfill gas from the city.
Also present at the groundbreaking were Reps. Wayne Gilchrest, John Sarbanes and Elijah Cummings.
“You will not find this kind of deal anywhere in the country, if not the world,” Cummings, chair of the House Subcommittee on the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation, said of the unique deal between private and public partners to make the plant a reality. “What it says is we don?t just do it right in Maryland, we create a model for others to follow.”
Adm. Thad Allen, commandant of the Coast Guard, hailed the new facility as an example of the service?s dedication to the environment. Allen said he had just returned from San Francisco, where he oversaw cleanup efforts in that city?s bay after a container ship struck the Golden Gate Bridge last Wednesday, spilling 58,000 gallons of oil.
“You see the worst of our energy situation, and the best,” he said. “The contrast is striking.”
