Marblehead questions plan for new Salem power plant

MARBLEHEAD – Plans to convert the soon-to-close Salem Harbor Power Station have aroused enthusiasm elsewhere on the North Shore, but Marblehead still has some questions about the proposal.Dominion, the corporate owner of the Salem power plant, is negotiating to sell the site to a new company, Footprint Power of New Jersey. It plans to close the plant by 2014. Footprint plans to use natural gas to generate electricity and the sell the electricity to New England outlets in 2016. The site is just across Salem Harbor from Marblehead.State Rep. Lori Ehrlich, D-Marblehead, attended a North Shore Chamber of Commerce meeting at the CoCo Key Hotel in Danvers Wednesday morning and heard the plan endorsed by Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, Beverly Mayor William Scanlon and the Chamber.However, the meeting left Ehrlich wanting more details, as she told the Marblehead Board of Health Wednesday evening. Board members asked her to keep them informed.?They?re very excited, they?re trying to replace a part of their tax base,” Ehrlich said – Dominion paid Salem $7.45 million in taxes per year – “but Marblehead is a very close neighbor of this site. We have to look at what is planned on its own merits and say, ?Is it something we want?”?Here in Marblehead,” she pointed out, “all we?ve had is the downside of the power plant.” Historically Marblehead was in the forefront of protests against plant pollution.Footprint is planning a 720-megawatt gas and diesel-burning power plant, about the same size as the present plant. It is the company?s first power plant and Ehrlich said they did not put forth a plan to take the present plant down.?They have the potential to run both plants simultaneously,” she said. “They say, ?Don?t worry, we?ll take it down,? but their answers were a little different at a Salem meeting.”Ehrlich said Footprint plans to obtain natural gas from a new pipeline that would run under homes and other structures.?The difficulty now is we don?t have too many details,” she said, noting that “The permitting process will give us lots of opportunity to express concerns and ask questions.”