By TIM FAULKNER/ecoRI.org News staff
MIDDLETOWN — With little money, no official status as an entity and a stalled wind-energy project, the East Bay Energy Consortium (EBEC) hopes to make a comeback.
Last year was tough on the regional collaborative. In June, it lost its bid at the Statehouse to become an official public-private state agency. The town of Bristol dropped out of the now eight-member municipal group in October, and countless public requests for information have drained some $30,000 from a dwindling budget.
Without a designation, the EBEC is unable to raise more funding or begin negotiations with National Grid about buying electricity from the wind project it's pursuing in the Tiverton Industrial Park.
A mere $32,000 remains in the EBEC budget, but the group plans for a turnaround this year. It has enough funding to complete two years of wind measurements — a valuable report for advancing and funding its wind turbine project. It expects a smoother reception at the Statehouse for gaining official status — this time as a nonprofit. Tiverton also elected new members to its Town Council who generally favor wind energy.
But the EBEC still faces challenges.
At its monthly meeting Jan. 7, the EBEC board noted that most of the information requests have come from Gerald Felise, one of the potential developers competing for the Tiverton wind energy project. In recent years, Felise has proposed other projects for the town’s business park, all of which have fizzled. But Felise has been persistent in seeking the EBEC’s wind measurement information, data that the EBEC has guarded in order to protect its investment in the project.
Protecting this data, however, comes with significant legal costs. New funding to pay the legal expense from its main financial backers, such as the state Renewable Energy Fund, has ceased.
In his latest information request, Felise is pushing for 164 items, including e-mails, that the EBEC has deemed private and critical to the project. The EBEC was sent a letter from the attorney general in December asking that it comply with the request. The board, however, is nearly out of funds to pay the legal costs to protect the data.
EBEC members discussed keeping the information private by simply discontinuing holding public meetings, because of a lack of official status as an entity.
But Christine Weglowski Forster, Middletown’s representative, noted that the EBEC’s bylaws require adhering to open meeting rules. The group also needs to be recognized as a public entity at some point in order to negotiate with National Grid for the various agreements required for a utility-scale wind project.
The General Assembly, however, must approve the EBEC’s request to become a legal organization. Last year, the legislation was turned back by strong opposition from a local Tea Party group and other opponents of large-scale wind projects. The legislation also was hampered by efforts to form the EBEC as an entity within the state Economic Development Corporation (EDC). The legislative proposal was submitted as the EDC was embroiled in the 38 Studios controversy, and was quickly defeated.
The most recent legislation seeks to form the EBEC as a nonprofit. The structuring may be less threatening to EBEC opponents, but the board still expects some public resistance.
Joseph Fraioli, Little Compton’s EBEC member, suggested that the latest legislation will likely end in the same result. Overall, he said, the EBEC is back where it started when it was formed in 2009. “We’re a dog chasing our own tail,” he said.
Eric Busch, the EBEC's project manager, currently works without compensation due to the drop in funding. He suggested the board devise a plan in the next two months to set its legislative goals and a communication strategy for working with Tiverton and the other seven city and town councils. The wind data, he said, has so far shown that the Tiverton wind project is worthwhile.