Phillips Middle School wins $326,000 grant for wood pellet boiler

AUGUSTA – The governor’s office announced that six educational facilities in Maine will be receiving more than $3.2 million in grant funding for oil to wood conversions. Among these institutions is Phillips Middle School, in MSAD 58, which learned today that it will receive a $326,000 grant for a wood pellet boiler.

“Maine has tremendous renewable natural resources,” Gov. Baldacci said, as part of a prepared statement. “It’s critical we put them to work to reduce our dependency on foreign oil and strengthen our economy. These grants help us to do that.”

The money is being awarded out of $11.4 million in federal American Reinvestment and Recovery Act funds, assigned to the Maine Forest Service for the purposes of creating energy savings and jobs. Coincidentally, Governor John Baldacci had previously stated he was inspired to help establish the grant after he visited Mt. Abram High School, which had recently installed a wood pellet boiler, in February 2009. Mt. Abram High School’s upgrade was also mentioned in Baldacci’s 2009 State of the State Address.

Assuming a wood pellet boiler is installed at Phillips Middle School, all MSAD 58 facilities will be utilizing wood-based heating systems, with the lone exception of the Stratton school.

“It’s a good thing,” MSAD 58 Superintendent Quenten Clark said Thursday. “In terms of oil, that leaves us with Stratton, which is a very efficient building.”

Wood pellets have three advantages over oil for the district, according to Clark. They are roughly two thirds the cost of heating oil, at current prices, and aren’t given to rapid changes in price. This predictability makes it easier to draft an accurate budget, Clark said, as school districts typically must overbudget for heating expenditures or risk a shortage. Additionally, wood pellets can be produced locally. While MSAD 58 currently purchases pellets from an Athens, Maine, mill Clark said the district intends to purchase them from the Geneva Wood Fuels plant in Strong, when it becomes operational again.

The Kingfield and Strong schools’ boilers are being installed now, and expected to become operational this spring. Those were chiefly funded through a $800,000 USDA Rural Development grant, awarded in May 2009. The two schools use a combined 48,000 gallons of oil in a typical year, and Clark hopes to recoup the $76,000 of local money spent on the project in the first year of operation.

Phillips’ school is newer, and more efficient, using 12,000 to 14,000 gallons of oil a year, according to Clark, but the district should still realize a savings from the conversion. He’s hoping the wood pellet boiler systems in four out of five schools will add up to significant savings for the district in the coming years.

“We’re going to keep having winter,” Clark joked. “That’s in my plan.”

The other facilities receiving grant funding include the Oxford Hills High School, the UM Cooperative Extension’s Presque Isle office, and middle/high school facilities in Greenville, Poland and Houlton. According to the Maine Forest Service, 41 applications were received for grant funding, and were reviewed by representatives from several state agencies. Another round of similar grants have been called for this spring.