PORT ANGELES — Challengers and promoters of Nippon’s proposed biomass energy project will face off one more time this week as the company prepares to clear its last regulatory hurdle.
The Olympic Region Clean Air Agency will host a public hearing Tuesday on the project’s air emissions permit.
The hearing will be at 6 p.m. at the Port Angeles Library, 2210 S. Peabody St.
Nippon Paper Industries USA mill manager Harold Norlund said he expects a decision on the permit within the next 30 days.
With the permit in hand, the company will be allowed to begin an on-site construction of a $71 million biomass cogeneration boiler, which would upgrade the existing boiler.
“We’re excited to be close to the end of this,” Norlund said.
The new boiler would double the amount of wood waste burned to produce steam to make telephone-book paper and newsprint (including paper for the Peninsula Daily News).
The boiler also would generate up to 20 megawatts of electrical power by burning the waste from logging sites and sawmills. The company could then sell credits for the electrical power.
The new boiler would reduce the mill’s emissions of carbon monoxide by 84.1 tons per year, sulfur dioxide by 163.6 tons per year and particulate matter by 77.3 tons per year but increase emissions of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds.
The increase in the latter — 37 tons per year for nitrogen oxides and 35.8 tons per year for volatile organic compounds — is what biomass opponents are worried about, said Diana Somerville.
Somerville, a Port Angeles resident, is the spokeswoman for the environmental groups that have tried to stop Nippon’s project, as well as a $55 million biomass boiler upgrade at Port Townsend Paper Corp. would produce up to 25 megawatts of electricity.
“The regulations have not kept pace with the human health impacts,” she said, citing concerns for asthma.
The emission increases are not considered significant by federal and state air-quality regulations, according to the project’s environmental report.
Norlund said he looks forward to getting construction under way but added that previous appeals by anti-biomass groups have delayed the project by three to four months.
The boiler was scheduled to be online in August 2012; it’s more likely to become operational toward the end of that year, Norlund said.
If ORCCA approves the permit, then construction will be allowed to commence even if the permit is appealed, he said.
Major construction should begin three to four months after the permit is approved, Norlund said.
The groups that had appealed the project are No Biomass Burn of Seattle, Port Townsend AirWatchers, World Temperate Rainforest Network, the Olympic Environmental Council, the Olympic Forest Coalition and the state chapter of the Sierra Club.
The same groups, joined by the Center for Environmental Law and Policy of Spokane, appealed a shoreline development permit approved by the city Planning Commission in September to the City Council.
The council upheld the permit in December.
The groups, minus the Sierra Club, have appealed the Port Townsend Paper Corp.’s proposed 24 megawatt biomass energy project to the state Pollution Control Board.
That appeal will be heard June 2-3.
The environmental groups are now forming a singular anti-biomass organization called Olympic Power Shift, Somerville said.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
