An incident on the ISO New England power grid Wednesday afternoon triggered a brief noise incident at the WIN Waste Innovations facility in Saugus when its steam turbine was unexpectedly taken off the grid, the company said in a statement.
Reports of a noise incident at the plant began circulating on social media around 4:30 p.m., with some residents also reporting their lights flickered. An issue with the power grid led to WIN’s steam turbine being taken off the grid virtually instantly, leading to the immediate venting of steam that could not be rerouted to the silencer.
The company said that the audible emission of steam lasted for just a few minutes before it was rerouted to the drag valve silencer. All safeguards at the facility operated as designed.
“We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your understanding,” the company said.
The incident marked the second audible venting of steam at the plant in less than a week, though WIN had no control over the turbine being taken off the grid Wednesday. The other incident, on Jan. 25, occurred during a planned outage when one of the two boilers at the plant was in operation. A turbine trip operated the plant’s secondary safety system, which led to the steam being vented through the roof. Then, the steam was rerouted to the silencer after a period of less than one minute, according to the statement.
Since an extended noise incident in September that prompted an emergency Board of Health meeting and a vow from that board to take action, residents have no doubt been on edge with regard to WIN.
