The idle Jonesboro biomass plant is expected to restart in February or March of the coming year, following the sale of the plant, along with six other biomass plants in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, under an agreement approved by a bankruptcy court judge on November 23. The electricity-generating plants, which have been owned by Stored Solar, have been acquired by Hartree Biomass Holdco LLC, a subsidiary of Hartree Partners LLC, which is based in New York City and is a global merchant commodities firm specializing in energy and its associated industries. The plant will be operated by a subsidiary called NE Renewable Power Jonesboro LLC, which will be the plant's fourth owner in its 35-year history.
      The Jonesboro facility has been idle since last June, having run intermittently during the past year. Louis Dinsmore of Trescott, who is the operations manager for the plant, says he expects it will be producing between 15 and 18 megawatts of power, which is about 75% to 80% of the plant's operating capacity. That will mean about 25 truckloads of biomass a day to feed the plant, or 30 to gain on the plant's inventory.
      Currently the facility has eight full-time employees and two part-time, and when it's fully staffed there will be 16 to 18 full-time workers. Dinsmore says the company is looking for licensed staff and has to do a few repairs to the plant.
      NE Renewable Power Jonesboro has applied to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to transfer the plant's licenses, including its air emission license and site location of development permit, to the new company. In its application, the company notes that it has retained the facility's key operations and engineering personnel and has engaged experienced biomass personnel to assist with the restart of the facility.
      "Everybody's excited about it -- new ownership and new opportunity," says Dinsmore. He notes that the workers just got new stickers for their hard hats with the new company name.
      According to bankruptcy court filings, Stored Solar had owed $17.8 million to its creditors, including Hartree Partners, which was owed $8.9 million, and logging companies in Maine. Several of the loggers had previously sued the company in an effort to get paid by Stored Solar. Area loggers had been hoping a new owner would restart the plant, as it provides a nearby buyer for the biomass such as wood chips, bark, tree limbs and tops that otherwise would be left on the ground.
      In 2016 Stored Solar had purchased the Jonesboro and West Enfield biomass plants from Covanta Energy Corporation. At the time hopes were high that it would infuse much needed demand in the state's logging and biomass industries, particularly in Washington County. In the Jonesboro plant's heyday it used about 250,000 green tons of biomass annually, supplied by about 12 vendors. At full capacity of 85 95% it operated around the clock, seven days a week, and supplied 23 to 24 megawatts of electricity and employed about 21 people.
      Before they were purchased by Covanta in 2008, the Jonesboro plant and its sister plant in West Enfield were co owned by Ridgewood Maine LLC and Indeck Energy Services Inc. The Jonesboro plant began commercial operation in 1987 but was shut down from 1995 to 2001 because of conditions in the electric power market.