Within a twelve-month period, the owner intended to obtain all environmental approvals, complete construction, and have Phase I of the new plant operational. Not only did ERL meet this tight schedule but it improved upon it by completing the permit application package within three weeks. Construction was initiated based on the accelerated tentative determination and the plant was operational and supplying electricity to the grid within thirteen months of the beginning of permit preparation. The facility generates all of the steam and electricity demands of the company's adjacent manufacturing facility and supplies excess electricity to a regional utility company. ERL also performed an air compliance audit at the facility and developed a compliance strategy for a tested exceedance of a permit limit for sulfuric acid emissions.
Ongoing work includes fish studies on a quarterly basis in the Connecticut River.
This knowledge and experience benefitted the client greatly when ERL obtained all of the necessary environmental permits and approvals for construction and operation of a 16 megawatt wood-fired power plant located in Massachusetts. ERL also prepared air, wastewater discharge, and solid waste permits in accordance with the state regulations. The air permitting work involved characterization and quantification of criteria and non-criteria emissions, air quality dispersion modeling, deposition modeling, air toxics analyses for a number of different fuel scenarios, and noise impact analysis. ERL completed the required EIRs and state permit applications and obtained all approvals necessary to construct the plant in less than one year. The speed in obtaining these approvals attests to ERL's project management capabilities and expertise in understanding and addressing public and town concerns on these types of projects.