5-Oct-2015

Project Description

Wilseyville Forest Product Yard

The Blue Mountain communities of West Point, Wilseyville, Rail Road Flat and Glencoe in Northern California have faced significant financial, environmental and social challenges over the last several decades after the closure of multiple lumber mills in the region.

These once prosperous towns have fallen on hard times. Median incomes have plummeted, free and reduced lunch subsidies at our two elementary schools hovers around 88%, local businesses in all four towns have cut staff or closed, and the unemployment rate was off the charts even before the great recession. Part of downtown West Point burned following a bar room melee. Meth use/addiction and associated social mayhem as well as uninspired political leadership played divisive blame games or worse, left us for dead. Finally, our forests have been neglected for two generations and the density of surface and ladder fuels provide abundant fuel for catastrophic wildfire. It is no surprise that the Butte Fire burned 71,000 acres in our beloved Mokelumne and Calaveras River watersheds, destroyed 818 homes, businesses and ranch buildings and killed two people.

There is no place in California in greater need for economic development than here.

While this picture is grim, our communities are not without strengths and assets. We contribute more to our children’s education than any other place in Calaveras County. Our youth center, serving at risk children, is the envy of the region. We have established the only FM community radio station in our County. We continue to host the biggest annual upcountry event in the area - West Point Lumberjack Days. Most important for this application is that we have built a broad-based, nationally recognized forest collaborative, the Amador Calaveras Consensus Group (ACCG) to develop our forest and meadow stewardship capacity. The ACCG was convened nearly six years ago by the applicant, ‘Calaveras Healthy Impact Product Solutions’ , a local non-profit called CHIPS, along with the Sierra Nevada Conservancy with focus on watershed restoration. Current projects include:

  • Implementation of a 10 year Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Act Allocation for the Calaveras Ranger District of the Stanislaus National Forest and the Amador Ranger District of the El Dorado National Forest.
  • The development of a 15,000 acre Community Forest covering all BLM lands in the in the Mokelumne Watershed.
  • Creation of a Stewardship Agreement with the Stanislaus National Forest.
  • Numerous NRCS projects on private land.

It is noteworthy that the ACCG has a proposal pending before the East Bay Municipal Utilities District to fund watershed restoration projects based on recommendations that emerged from the Mokelumne Avoided Cost Analyses study. Finally, out of necessity, we are participating in a massive community response to the Butte Fire.

The need to establish a diversified forest economy based upon restoration and stewardship including fire safe principles has never been more apparent.

CHIPS and ACCG have been very successful at winning funding for forest, meadow, and watershed projects. Funding has come from Federal and State Agency budgets, grants, and in kind services. We have generated many tons of “forest waste” from project work in the Blue Mountain region. It is well known that restoration fieldwork will not cover its costs without a value-added economic benefit from products derived from small diameter tree and brush (wood waste) removal from our forest projects. This thinking has led the CHIPS Board to purchase a 13 acre former mill site in Wilseyville to establish a Forest Product Yard to process woody biomass. Wilseyvilleis strategically located at the center of our forest project area so that the biomass haul to the yard is only 15-20 miles. In addition to forest waste, CHIPS will assume responsibility for the County Green Waste Program which will add 1 FTE position.

Power Plant. The anchor project within the yard is a 3 megawatt wood gasification power plant that will employ 12 people directly and increase the pace and scale of the forest and meadow restorationcreatingan additional 35-50 indirect jobs depending on the season.

Key to the power plant’s viability is California’s new bioenergy law SB1122, whereby Utilities are mandated to acquire 250 MW of small scale bioenergy, 50 MW of which must be from forest sources. The final contract for this auction process was approved by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) on September 17th 2015 making the start date of the program known. While the auction will begin with an offer at 12.772 cents per KWh, (a 25% premium to existing contracts) the CPUC’s own published report shows they expect the mid-range price to be 21.9 cents per KWh. This will also be done under a long term (20 year) contract to an AAA rated utility, making the contract financeable. By sizing our project for the maximum load available under this utility contract (3MW) we will be gaining the maximum economies of scale vis-à-vis project labor costs.

The power plant will produce a biochar co-product that sells wholesale in the agricultural market today for between 79-149 cents per lb. In being conservative, we expect to receive 35 cents per lb. Since the plant will generate a minimum of 450 lbs. of biochar per hour, it will be valued at over $1,000,000 in annual revenue.

Composting. A composting project at the Product Yard will utilize forest humus, clean green waste, local turkey manure, and bio-char from the plant to produce a premium soil amendment rich in nutrients with a high capacity for water absorption and retention with excellent tilth-building qualities. We expect to produce approximately 40 tons of compost per year for sale to local grape, fruit and vegetable growers.

Greenhouse. A Native American-operated greenhouse is also included in the plans for the product yard. The greenhouse will be constructed of 5-wall polycarbonate(perfect for mitigating summer heat and winter chill at this elevation) and measure 30’x 60’. The Native Plant Greenhouse will have multiple benefits closely aligned with community/regional needs and economic renewal. Unfortunately, the lack of jobs and long term depression in economic development has left the local Mi-Wuk people with few opportunities. They do possess the knowledge and interest in specialized plants that provide materials for basketry, cording and the maintenance of cultural traditions. A greenhouse developed and run by Mi-Wuk people will provide 1 FTE and business experience.

Plants from the greenhouse will be a source for fire restoration projects both for Calaveras County following the massive Butte fire and fires that affect areas throughout California. Native plants will also support the restoration of 240 Mi-Wuk cultural sites in conjunction with Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Act projects currently underway in the Stanislaus and Eldorado National Forests.

Personnel. To develop the Forest Product Yard, CHIPS has retained the services of two Sierra Fellows through the Sierra Institute headquartered in Burney, CA. One, Robert Zellers is an engineer with strong local contracting ties. The other intern Mary Sketch, has a Master’s Degree from Brown University and has experience working with Forest Collaboratives in the Pacific Northwest. Our project team will include our Board Chair Steve Wilensky, Vice Chair Ernie LaCarra Cabral, CFO Suzette Ariza, Board Secretary Rick Torgerson, Board Engineer Alan Leavitt, Board Member Donna Vial, Board Member Velma Whitebear of Indian Manpower, Rod Landreth, field operations manager and numerous Blue Mountain Community volunteers including Mi-Wuk Tribal Leaders and local nursery operators working on the greenhouse project.

Progress. Approval of the project is pending before the Calaveras County Planning Department under an administrative use permit application and the following studies are complete: The Preliminary Engineering Report, PGE System Impact Study, Phase II Environmental Site Assessments, Wilseyville Woody Biomass Value-Added Product Yard Feasibility Study, and Biomass Feedstock Procurement Plan. These reports are included as attachments to this document.

We have worked toward this moment for 12 ½ years. We have done everything in our power to create community and legislative support for our efforts. The National Forest Foundation, Nature Conservancy, USDA, BLM, USFS, NRCS, Amador Fire Safe Council, Calaveras Foothills Fire Safe Council and numerous other organizations and individuals have provided funds and contracts to help us make progress toward our goal of building a strong, sustainable, environmentally sound, forest and watershed-based economy. Your funding of this proposal would allow us to completethe infrastructure necessary for the Wilseyville Forest Product Yard including the biofuel power plant. With these tasks completed and the kilowatt price set (the auction process will begin within the year) we will receive the investments necessary to install the gasification technology provided by our partner, Phoenix Energy.

We hope you can look favorably upon this decade-long labor of love.

Sincerely,

Steve Wilensky

CHIPS Board Chair

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