POWERING FOR THE FUTURE

Mike McCagg

ccSCOOP News

10-26-09 - 10-45 a.m. - Everything old is new again.

With the country focusing on alternative energy sources, the residents of Stuyvesant will soon benefit from one of those sources: water power. A partnership between the Town of Stuyvesant and Albany Engineering Corp. is bringing the historic Stuyvesant Falls hydro- electric plant back to life. Harnessing the power of the Kinderhook Creek, the hydroelectric plant and dam, which have not been used for decades, is expected to start producing power again by the fall of 2010, accounting to Stuyvesant Supervisor Valerie Bertram. Albany Engineering also owns a hydro plant in Mechanicville and operates the Green Island hydro plant owned by the Green Island Power Authority.

James Besha, president of Albany Engineering, told ccSCOOP on Thursday, “We are doing rehab work inside and won’t be doing much outside work until the spring. But we hope, at this time, to start producing power next fall.”

“The building was just a mess. The insides have been worked on, and now they have to work on the mechanics of it,” said Bertram.  

Once operational again, the facility will produce 7,000 kilowatt hours of electricity—enough to power approximately 2,000 homes. “We are doubling [the previous capacity of the facility],” Besha said. The power will be sold into the electrical grid, and the Town will receive a percentage of the profits from the sale, he said.

The revenue realized by the Town “will be dependent on how much the plant produces and the market rate,” said Bertram.

The process for realizing the power-generating capabilities of the plant has been long and convoluted. Albany Engineering and the town were granted a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission license for the facility in 2003 when it sought to buy the idle plant. Negotiations between Albany Engineering and the owner, Erie Boulevard Hydropower LP, broke down, and Stuyvesant eventually claimed the building through eminent domain. Besha said a new public hearing for a revised license for the plant will be held in the next month or two.  

The plant has already had two lives. It was first constructed in 1899 to supply power to a trolley service that ran from Albany to Hudson. In 1942, a larger operation was created at the hydroelectric facility to meet the growing demand for electricity that resulted in part from World War II.