BROWNSTOWN — The consultant for a project expected to produce more than $1.3 million in energy and operational savings for the town over the next 20 years recently detailed the cost for that work.
“We got the cost down, which is always good news when I come back with some final numbers that are less than what I told you,” Rick Anderson said.
Anderson, the business development director for Veregy, said the base contract price to convert the town’s wastewater treatment plant from electricity to solar power and convert more than 230 streetlights from sodium vapor bubs to LED is $913,623.
“I think the original number was $942,000 and some change so we’re down almost $30,000, which is nice,” he said during a council meeting Monday night at town hall.
Anderson said the information he presented was just to give council members a really basic idea of the down payment ($200,000) and the loan amount ($713,632) and a rebate of $257,935 from federal Inflation Reduction Act that could be used to reduce the loan amount to $455,697.
The projects are expected to produce $1,330,298 over 20 years, while the initial payback for the loan is 19.32 years. That would be reduced to 16.81 years if the council applied the federal IRA payment toward the loan.
Anderson said the plan was for the town to have received a couple of quotes from local financial institutions to provide funding for the project before Monday’s meeting.
He said town Clerk-treasurer David Willey had been working with a couple of local banks that might have interest in the loans, but neither had committed any information yet.
“I also can get Dave in touch with a couple of national lenders that have worked with some of our clients,” Anderson said. “I am technically supposed to stay very neutral on this because again the relationship is between you and the lending institution.”
The loan for the work would be repaid from guaranteed energy savings from the projects, while the council has said in the past that the down payment would be paid with American Rescue Plan funds.
The hope is to have the projects finished by the end of this year so the federal funds for the project would be available in 2024, Anderson said.
“You get the check the year after it’s installed,” Anderson said.
He said he would keep working on the project and come back in two weeks to the next council meeting on June 19.
The state’s energy savings program allows communities to do guaranteed savings projects, which could include lighting, solar and heating, ventilation and air conditioning.