The V.I. Water and Power Authority’s energy-saving waste-heat boiler is in the very last stages of testing and beginning to come online, WAPA Executive Director Hugo Hodge Jr. told the utility’s governing board Thursday.
The waste-heat recycling generator, the second of its kind for the island, will reduce fuel consumption and improve efficiency in the Richmond plant by capturing the energy normally exhausted into the air from two gas turbines and recycling it to generate steam for water and power production.
The new boiler generates more than half as much electricity as the original boiler, essentially getting a 50 percent boost in the power generated by a gallon of fuel. The fuel-and-money-saving boiler was to be complete before the end of 2008 but was delayed, in part due to long delays in shipping custom-made parts from Asia. Substandard parts, since replaced by the contractor doing the work, led to more delays last fall.
Hodge said the unit seemed to be performing well, but complex chemical tests had to be done on the oil used in the feeder turbines before the final adjustments could be made and the system signed off as ready to go.
Danny Smith, a technical consultant with the Maguire Group—the company overseeing the project—said testing the fuel oil will show how hot the inside of the turbines are over time, which "is essential to determine the composition and temperature of the gas going into the waste-heat boiler."
Results should be in by March 15 and the final paperwork complete by the end of March, Smith said. Once that is done, WAPA can submit to the Public Services Commission for a change in rates and begin recovering some of the funds, Hodge said.
Regardless of the paperwork, because the unit is up and running Hodge said that WAPA "will get the benefit of the oil savings right away."
In other news, the board voted to extend the contracts of Island Mechanical, the company installing the boiler, until the end of March. Voting yea were board chairwoman Juanita Young, members Donald Francois, Gerald Groner, Noel Loftus, Cheryl Boynes-Jackson and Kenneth Hermon. Wayne Biggs recused himself because the company’s license was before the Division of Licensing and Consumer Affairs, which Biggs heads. Absent were Brenda Benjamin, Robert Mathes and St. Claire Williams. Maguire Group, the company managing the entire project, had its contract extended until May, with all those present voting yea.
The board also approved a $12.2 million contract to Dashiell Corp. to design and build a new substation in Estate Richmond on St. Croix, near the main power plant. The substation will be the highest voltage unit in the territory and will reduce St. Croix line losses by making the transmission grid more efficient. There will be less of a drop in current and voltage, as power is routed to Frederiksted, Hodge said. The substation will also enable alternative power supplies—whether wind, solar or the proposed waste-to-energy plant—to be hooked into the grid, he said.
Dashiell Corp. estimates the substation will come online about 20 months after the contract is approved. Gerald Groner recused himself because of a business relationship with Dashiell Corp. The rest of the members present voted yea.
