The compensation Crown Hydro will pay the Park Board is $100,000 up front, and $30,000 a year for 10 years, and the amount per year for the remaining 50 year lease to be determined. $30,000 a year is a pittance for a multi-million dollar business to lease that kind of space.
This isn't another Riverside Plant- this is small hydro. For a plant that probably won't even produce a million a year in revenue it's ridiculous to expect six figure sums for a little chunk of dirt.
Further, the Park Board could quite easily receive $30,000 a year in revenue by leasing 2 or 3 cell phone antenna sites, as they typically lease for $10,000 to $15,000 per year.
There are only a few cell sites that pull in that kind of rent, usually on hilltops or tall buildings. I can think of only a couple good sites on park property, and with plenty of competing sites nearby they'll never earn $15k/year in rent. Given that most of the park sites have no power, they'd be the last to be rented.
There are a number of unknown risks, that is, the size of the following risks are unknown but should be known since they could be large or could be small.
First, this area is riddled with ruins of mills and underground tunnels and caves. The geology is limestone and sandstone, neither of which is particular strong rock. Historically, this area has had 2 major cave-ins, one of which nearly destroyed the falls, during construction projects. What is the degree of risk involved in excavating the gatehouse intake area, the generator "pit" and the tail race connections? What might they run into? What accident might happen? Despite a large amount of insurance, some accidents are hard to reverse. What if part of the falls or Stone Arch Bridge collapses? What about loss of life?
We have the same risks anytime the city repairs a sewer pipe. Chris, you really need to get a sense of proportion here...
Perhaps all of those risks are minutely small. But we don't really know, so it seems premature to build this project without knowing.
They are minutely small, especially compared to the aging nuclear plant upriver, etc..
There are other less concrete risks. During construction, the area will be a mess, as is common for such projects. That might deter enough tourists and potential buyers of new riverfront lofts away that some development might stall or be canceled. Maybe Minneapolis' reputation will be tarnished. Just the idea that this project might go through already has the residents in the area upset. Even if their concerns prove to be false fears, how much financial impact will such fears have on developers doing business or about to do business in the area? Word will get around. People will think twice about buying a $200,000 to $1,000,000 riverfront condo if they hear horror stories, even if false, from people who live there.
The condo market is cyclic (remember the early '80s) and will implode of it's own accord anyway.
Again, such risks are probably small. But they need to be considered.
Again, we need a sense of proportion here.
Another small, but completely unanalyzed risk is that of pollution. What sorts of contaminations might be found in all that soil to be excavated and moved around? And being hard on the river, and in channels which open to the river, what are the chances some of it might find its way into the river? Do we want to take that chance?
Many sewer lines run under sometimes polluted park property too... Hopefully it will not take several Park Board meetings, etc.. to gain approval for repairs should one burst.
There are risks to the aesthetics of the Falls (water flow levels) and the Stone Arch Bridge (modern, cheap extension). Those are hard to quantify, but if people think the falls or the bridge don't look as good, it makes a difference -- to residents and visitors, and the businesses which depend on those visitors.
The water diverted from the falls is insignificant- again, this isn't another Hoover Dam. The bridge itself will not be touched, and the approach that will be slightly modified isn't original anyway.
Property values, just like stock market values, are highly affected to subjective, personal opinion. The people who live there now are virtually up in arms about it. Does it matter whether they will be able to see it after it's built? Only slightly. If people perceive it as undesirable, property values will be less. If people think an area is great to live in, the property values go up.
Given the rising tide of crime nearby, an underground turbine is the least of their worries.
Read my other details, and you may find that not only do the people have some subjective reasons for worrying about property values, but they have some objective reasons, as well.
Did you know that prior to trying to site the generator in the Mill Ruins Park on Park Board property, Crown Hydro was working on building it in the basement of the Crown Roller Mill? Did you know that the reasons they are not building it there is because they would not promise in writing to the owner of the Crown Roller Mill building that there would be no vibration and no damage from such vibration?
That says more about the stability of that rebuilt building than the strength of the rock underneath.
Further, the owner of the Crown Roller Mill visited 2 hydro power plants similar in size and nature to the one that Crown Hydro proposes, and observed significant vibration and noise being emitted at both sites. This is what caused his concern for his building.
Significant?... This is a water turbine generator, not a diesel running at 100 RPM.
One last risk, of sorts. Crown Hydro is building this with $5.1 million from the renewable energy fund. That's $5.1 million that will not be used to fund other renewable energy projects, such as wind generation. Did you know that Minnesota is the 3rd largest wind power generator? Maybe that money would be better spent somewhere else. The "risk" here is called "lost opportunity cost." We may never know what good we could have done with that money, and how it would affect our state's economy and welfare.
Our city has little wind energy potential and lots of hydro potential... thusly a wind farm on say Lowry Hill would be an even worse investment.
Crown Hydro proposes to build a 3.2 megawatt (with full flow) generation plant, which is roughly enough to power 2,700 homes, they say. Their FERC license requires Excel Energy to pay Crown Hydro its "highest avoided cost" which in essence means a rate equal to the highest cost that Excel has to generate electricity anywhere in its system. While that provides a premium price to Crown Hydro, it also means a higher cost to customers of Excel Energy.
But still competitive with wind and much lower than solar. BTW, if you really want cheap electricity you should be supporting new coal plants.
Right. So we should just ignore all potential liabilities when evaluating any project? Give me a break. This project has a couple of very significant possible liabilities.
One, the zoning for the area is not correct for building the hydro power plant there.
This was an industrial site before we even had zoning laws.
FERC will not issue the generation license unless it is. The Park Board staff proposed to the commissioners that they approve a "partial" lease, which did not include many of the details which would in theory be worked out later. However, by state law (as I understand it and I am not a lawyer) the lessor, in this case, the Park Board, is responsible for getting the zoning changes made. If for some reason, the zoning is not changed, or for some other reason, the Park Board and Crown Hydro cannot come to terms on the details of the lease and operation and maintenance agreements, than Crown Hydro has some really good standing in court to sue the Park Board because they have leased some land they cannot use as intended. The Park Board is essentially liable for making the project work if they sign the lease.
This is park property- zoning codes do not apply.
Likewise the amount of water available to Crown Hydro gets caught up in similar liabilities. Other potential uses of the river which might affect the flow would be at risk, because they might prevent Crown Hydro from conducting business as promised. Crown Hydro may again have solid ground in court to sue the Park Board or the City or the County or whoever messes up the water flow (e.g. the proposed white water rafting facility on the river).
Water law tends to give priority to the earliest users, so Crown Hydro would have little grounds for suit.
In the end in all of these lawsuits, we the taxpayer will pay Crown Hydro.
Again, who gets the water first is pretty well spelled out.
Crown Hydro is not stupid. They have been working on this a long time and they have some good legal and project advice. They are not going to foolishly risk their investment and future income to some situation they can legally prevent from happening, or make somebody else pay them for.
Then again, perhaps like other enterprises denied permits they might sue for denial?
What do you have? Apparently you have not read the documents at the Mill City Lofts web site, which I provided a link to. Do you think I'm just making this stuff up?
I didn't realize Mill City lofts was now an authouitive source of engineering knowledge.
I know of no "report" other than the marketing materials that Crown Hydro has provided to the Park Board, and the verbal report given by staff to the commissioners. Neither of these qualifies as a dispassionate analysis of the situation.
I've received lots of information and answers from folks at Crown Hydro -- thanks go to them. It wasn't easy to come to a decision on what I felt would be the correct path. Crown Hydro clearly is doing a good job of developing its project, but you have to remember, they are motivated by self interest first. This isn't a charity cause; they're in it for the business.
Agreed- it is a credit to Crown Hydro that they have been so patient with NIMBY objections.
Just because an upstanding business wants to do something, does not mean it is a good idea for the taxpayer to endorse and support it. Sometimes our best needs and purposes are going to conflict.
And following that logic, we should have thrown those tour boats out of our Boom Island moorage before they left on their own.
This is one of those cases. We don't need 3.2 megawatts (maximum, low water will mean less) of additional hydro generated electricity at this location that badly. The Park Board can get $30,000 a year from other sources. The downsides are not outweighed by the upsides.
But we do need clean energy... Or would you prefer to build another nuclear plant?
Consider also that if the Park Board spurns small hydro it will probably end up in the basements of the Post Office. They already have a few hundred kilowatts of diesel generating capacity and mostly use it to go offline during high energy demand periods. The Postal Service is heavily into alternative energy and would love to have a small hydro plant with no capital investment. And the Postal Service being a federal agency, the Park Board would have little say in the matter...
hanging on in Hawthorne,
Dyna Sluyter
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