MSAD 58’s wood pellet heating systems celebrated

KINGFIELD – The superintendent and business owner cut the red ribbon to the applause of seventh graders, officially opening the wood pellet boiler for operation.

MSAD 58 Superintendent Quenten Clark and Skanden Energy President Laura Colban both said they hoped the district’s use of wood-based heating systems signaled the beginning of a new industry in Maine.

“We may be the most oil dependent state in the country, per capita,” Clark said, “but we also have the most trees in the country, per capita.”

The new Skanden Energy boilers installed at Strong Elementary School and Kingfield Elementary School run off of wood pellets; processed wood purchased from a plant in Athens, Maine. The schools combine to use more than 48,000 gallons of heating oil in a typical year, and Colban said that the district could look to save more than $60,000 in the first year of operation alone.

Clark said he began researching alternatives to oil years earlier, when a provider declared  bankruptcy. He eventually got in contact with Colban, who was interested in installing wood pellet boilers in MSAD 58 schools. The company and school system began working to find funding, eventually landing an $800,000 U.S. Department of Agriculture grant, with the help of Maine’s Sen. Susan Collins, Sen. Olympia Snowe and Congressman Michael Michaud. The grant provided the chief source of funding for the project.

“The most important thing about this,” Colban said, “is we came together to do this. This was such a community effort.”

Colban and Clark recognized the work done by the maintenance staff of MSAD 58, who assembled the sheds containing the boiler and pellet silo, administrators who worked through the reams of paperwork, as well as USDA and the state’s congressional representatives. School Board Chair Mike Pond, Colban noted, helped workers lay heating ducts when assistance was needed.

The boilers do not represent the district’s last alternative energy efforts. Phillips Elementary School could be the next potential upgrade, as one of six facilities qualifying for $3.2 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding distributed through the Maine Forest Service. A $326,000 grant for a wood pellet boiler is available for the Phillips school. If upgraded, that would leave Stratton Elementary School as the only facility in MSAD 58 still using primarily oil for heat.

Mt. Abram High School, Strong and Kingfield now represent three out of five of the schools in the state using wood for heat, according to Clark.

“We recognize we’re leaders in this,” he said, inviting anyone interested in the project to come and view the system in action. He noted other school districts, from as far away as Nova Scotia, had expressed interest in touring MSAD 58 facilities.

Michaud and Collins both sent staff members to the event, who addressed seventh graders witnessing the ribbon-cutting. Andrea Quaid, from Michaud’s office, read a brief statement from the congressman, which lauded MSAD 58 and Skanden Energy. Thanking the USDA was David Heidrich, Jr., from Collins’ office, who recounted the effort that had gone into making the project happen.

“It reached a point,” he recalled, “where I could call USDA and they’d already know what I was calling about.”

The boilers, Skanden Energy MultiFuels, are monitored through a computer, which automatically emails the company in the case of a breakdown, so the technician knows what parts to bring. Ash is cleaned from the system automatically, stored in a nearby bin for easy removal. In the end, however, Clark is most pleased with being able to purchase fuel locally, as well as the savings from no longer using oil.

“The money we’re saving will go toward saving teaching jobs,” Clark said, “which will improve the education for our students.”