Summit Hydropower, Inc.

Collinsville Hydro
Avon - Burlington - Canton

COLLINSVILLE UPPER AND LOWER HYDRO PROJECT

The Collinsville upper and lower dams are typical retired New England mill dams. The upper dam is located in Canton on the Farmington River and the lower is located immediately downstream in Avon and Burlington, CT. Hydropower at this location actually began in the late 1700’s when a wooden dam was built near the current upper dam to power a grist mill. In the early 1800’s the Collins Company was formed and the extant upper dam and mill building were built in 1837. Several turbines in the mill building powered the manufacturing equipment. In 1934 the extant upper powerhouse was built on the west end of the dam to utilize more available flow in the river for electricity production. The lower dam and powerhouse were built in 1914 to provide additional electricity for the growing demand. In 1966 both the upper and lower dams and powerhouses were shut down, retired and donated to CT DEP.

Beginning in 1988 my company, Summit Hydro based in Avon, began the long, painstaking and costly task of obtaining licenses from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for the Collinsville dams in anticipation of putting them back on line to generate clean, renewable electricity. In the United States in order to put a hydro facility on line a FERC license or exemption must first be obtained. The amount of work invested by Summit to obtain the FERC licenses is almost incomprehensible: thousands of hours of work, countless studies, surveys, meetings, correspondences, designs, drawings, analyses, cash flow statements. Many concerns of agencies, environmental groups, municipalities and individuals were addressed and mitigated. After Summit submitted the final license applications it took FERC 11 years to finally grant the licenses!

A standard requirement of the licenses is that construction must begin within 4 years of license issuance. Although this seems like ample time, it is known in the industry, and by FERC staff that it is too short, especially for complicated projects like the Collinsville. For example, The DEP was positive towards Summit leasing the facilities, but it took over 3 years to pass the unopposed legislation that was required to allow DEP to enter leases. Although Summit maintained unwavering diligence in obtaining property rights, final designs, contracts, financing, etc., it unfortunately took more than 4 years and FERC terminated the licenses. However, before the licenses were terminated, Summit began working with Congressman Murphy’s office on the goal of introducing a bill to reinstate the licenses back to Summit and extend the construction start dates. Bills of this nature have been passed before for other licensees that also had difficulty meeting the tight 4 year time period.

What happened next is rather startling; Canton First Selectman Dick Barlow asked the Congressman to introduce a bill to reinstate Summit’s licenses and transfer them to Canton! The Congressman’s office then turned its back on Summit and introduced a bill that proposes to pirate Summit’s good work and give the licenses to the Town. Last year bills HR 4451 and companion bill S 3532 passed the house then failed in the Senate. However, this year, on April 4, 2011, the bills were reintroduced as HR 1353 and S 715. To see bill details go to www.thomas.loc.gov then click “Bill Number”, type in HR1353, click “search”, click “all information” or “text of bill”.

In a nutshell, our governmental system has let down a local renewable energy business. However, there are more important negative aspects of this bill that I wish to point out. It is unprecedented legislation; the transfer of a FERC license to a third party without consent of the original licensee has never been done, thus it will set a negative precedent in the hydro industry which will tend to deter future hydro development. In addition, this bill will also circumvent due process. After going through the proper steps, FERC granted the licenses to Summit. Canton has not gone through the proper steps.

In my opinion this proposed legislation is improper and borderline unethical. If the Town is interested in developing and owning the projects then it would seem that the first step would be to sit down and discuss it with the local company that has vast experience and a wealth of knowledge on the projects, Summit Hydro, rather than taking the current approach.

Developing small hydro projects successfully is extremely difficult, time consuming and risky. At current rates these projects are projected to be economically difficult. There is no guarantee that these projects will be feasible. The true economic feasibility will not be known until just before the shovel is put in the ground. It is easy to see the economic difficulty of these projects when examining the rough numbers: gross annual revenue under current rates of only about $250,000 each, annual O&M expenses of roughly $125,000 each and a project cost of several million dollars each. Therefore they should not be viewed as a source of profit. Incentives from public funds will be necessary to make these projects feasible. However, I believe that, regardless of who develops the sites, there is a limit at which public funds should not be granted if the cost per kWh is too high. I believe that renewables should be encouraged, but not at any cost.

Another point worth noting is that the Collinsville lower project is not located in Canton. It is located in Avon and Burlington. This raises the question why is the Town of Canton seeking the license for the lower project which is not located in Canton?

For further details as to why the proposed legislation should not go forward, please click here: “Letter to Blumenthal”.

In my opinion this legislation is improper and should be amended to reinstate the licenses back to Summit. If you have any comments on this I encourage you to contact me, Congressman Murphy and/or the Canton First Selectmen.

In any event Summit has a lot to offer in terms of experience and accomplished work on these projects. I want to see these projects move forward and am not looking for any monetary profit. Provided we resolve this license pirating issue in a fair manner I stand willing to cooperate with any municipalities and/or other entities towards the goal of furthering the development of the Collinsville Hydroelectric Projects.

Photos of the Collinsville Site
Click on any photo to zoom

Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Summit Hydro owner Duncan Broatch surveying cross sections in river for Collinsville Lower Fish Transportability Study, February 28, 1991.
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Upper Dam Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Upper Power House Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Upper Forebay and Trash Racks Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Upper Interior of Power House Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Lower Power House Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Lower Dam Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Lower Trash racks Return to Top
Click photo to enlarge, use back button to return to page	Collinsville Lower Power House Interior Return to Top

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