Co-generation power plant will save UC and Faxton-St. Luke's $800,000 a year

Photo by Joseph J. Mezzanini / UDN

NEW HARTFORD, July 17, 2009 -- Faxton-St. Luke's Healthcare and Utica College said the students and patients they serve will benefit from the hundreds of thousands of dollars the two institutions will save, thanks to a new $15 million power plant they will share.

"It takes an entire community to make things like this happen," Faxton-St. Luke's CEO Scott Perra said.

The Burrstone Power Station built on the Faxton-St. Luke's Healthcare, St. Luke's campus on Champlain Avenue, uses co-generation technology. UC and Faxton-St. Luke's will share the power it produces. Together, they plan on saving an estimated $800,000 per year now that the plant is done.

Perra said the healthcare center's customers will not see a decrease in rates, but the savings will help to defray increases. He said hospitals are facing rising costs because of cuts in Medicare reimbursements and normally, those costs are passed down through price increases. This time, he hopes the electricity bill's savings can lesson the burden on customers.

"The things the this will hopefully mitigate would be costs that we normally have no choice but to pass on," Perra said.

A crowd celebrates the grand opening of the co-generation energy plant that will be shared by Faxton-St. Luke's Healthcare and Utica College. (PHOTO BY JOSEPH J. MEZZANINI / UDN)

Utica College President Todd Hutton said the money his school saves will go in the College's general fund, which he says will increase the number of programs and facilities the school can afford.

"The students are going to see this money in the improvement of their academic programs," Hutton said. "That's the real benefit for our student here."

Hutton also said that while there are no plans as of now for his students to study the facility, that opportunity could come in the near future.

"As of now, we have no definite plans for that, but we know the opportunities it could present for our students in a number of areas of study," he said.

The co-generation plant was built by Bette & Cring, which will sell it's power to the two facilities. $1 million in funding was paid for by the New York State Energy Research & Development Authority.

"Our job at NYSERDA is to find the best way to return the money to serve the people it comes from, the taxpayers," NYSERDA's Dr. Dana Levy said.

HOW IT WORKS

The plant burns natural gas, which is normal for power generation plants. What is abnormal is that the steam released from the burning process is reused as power as opposed to being sent into the atmosphere through a smoke stack.

Guests mingle at the dedication of the Burrstone Power Station at the Faxton-St. Luke's Healthcare, St. Luke's campus, on July 16th, 2009. (PHOTO BY JOSEPH J. MEZZANINI / UDN)

The plant cannot produce enough energy when the schools and hospitals are at their energy "peak", then it will only produce 80 percent of the energy for each facility. The remaining 20 percent will come from National Grid. When more lights get turned off and less electricity is being used, such as at nighttime, the co-generator will be producing more energy than the facilities need. That's where the savings come in. The "extra" energy produced during non-peak hours will then be sold to National Grid, which provides energy to the entire community.

While co-generation plants make up about 1/7 of the energy in New York State, Levy said the new plant on Champlain Avenue will be the first one in the state to provide power to two neighboring facilities. Normally, when power has to cross a street or a boundary, New York State considers it a "public" provider, and it would have to live under stricter regulations and requirements. in this case, the state provided an exception because of the small distance between the two facilities.

"This was a real trailblazing opportunity. They've built a model that can serve the hospital and the college from one location. That has never happened before in New York State."