WESTBROOK – Another chapter in the long saga of Casella Waste Systems’ plan to build a transfer facility on land it owns off County Road in Westbrook was written this week.
The Westbrook Planning Board voted unanimously Tuesday to approve a new site plan for the construction of the Casella Environmental Park, which would include a main access road, a gatehouse, a residential drop-off area and a municipal solid waste transfer building. The facility, which would operate six days per week, could handle up to 1,000 tons of trash per day. Construction could begin later this summer.
The company had originally proposed a building to process trash into burnable pellets, which would have then been used as fuel at the company’s Maine Energy Recovery Co. incinerator in Biddeford.
But in April, Casella spokesman Joseph Fusco said that since the company is planning to close the Biddeford plant, there would be no need to create the burnable pellets. As a result, the proposal before the Planning Board this week eliminated the trash processing building.
The company’s history with the project in Westbrook is a long one. According to a memo by City Planner Molly Just, Casella, which operates Pine Tree Waste, received approval for a waste collection and processing facility at the site on Nov. 7, 2000, and then for a modified project on Feb. 15, 2005.
The company’s most recent site plan approval came on March 17, 2009, and that plan included all of the elements approved by the board this week, plus the trash processing facility, now not needed. Just said that the company’s 2009 approval had since expired, which necessitated the new site plan approval before the project could move forward again.
Scott Collins of St. Germain Collins, the engineering firm working with Casella on the project, told the board that work at the site began in 2009, but was stopped before anything could be constructed. In response to a question from the board, Collins said he understood that construction was stopped because there were some regulation changes made the project “not feasible.” He did not explain what the regulations or the changes were.
Collins told the board that Casella is now looking to complete the project, with the hopes of starting work in August and completion by next spring.
While there have been long delays regarding the project in Westbrook, the city has seen some significant benefits from the company.
In March 2009, after receiving Planning Board approval to expand the scope of the project and to add a solid waste transfer station, Casella upgraded its host community agreement with the city, offering a new curbside automated trash and recycling program, worth nearly $1 million, at no cost, an arrangement that is still ongoing. Originally, the company was going to provide just free curbside recycling, at a value of $540,000.
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