By of the

The Walker administration has canceled plans to build a biomass power plant at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The power plant, a priority of former Gov. Jim Doyle, will burn natural gas instead.

The state can expect to save about $75 million to $80 million as a result of the decision, said Jeff Plale, Walker's new director of state facilities and former Democratic state senator from Milwaukee County.

The state will save $100 million by not pursuing biomass but will have to spend $20 million to $25 million to add another natural gas boiler to the plant, he said.

"It was a decision based on cost. The capital cost of that project was roughly $100 million, and it was the belief of the agency and the governor that that price tag was just way too high," Plale said.

Construction of the $251 million UW power plant project began last fall and represents nearly one-fifth of the state's 2009-'11 capital budget. The project was being built in phases, with the natural gas portion being built first and the biomass to come later.

Instead of picking the cheapest option - burning coal - state and UW officials opted for a combination of natural gas and biomass from local tree trimmings and crops.

The move is the latest in a series of steps reversing energy and related policies supported by the Doyle administration, including cancellation of the high-speed train proposed to link Milwaukee and Madison and legislation unveiled last week that could slow development of wind power projects in the state.

In November, after defeating Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett in the race for governor, Scott Walker had asked the Doyle administration to stop work on the biomass portion of the UW-Madison project.

The decision to cancel the biomass part of the project was made Thursday by Walker, Plale said.

Doyle announced the UW-Madison heating plant would no longer burn coal after a federal judge ruled in favor of the Sierra Club in an air pollution lawsuit stemming from emissions from the Madison campus coal-fired power plant.

"The coal-fired boilers will be retired by 2012 as planned," Administration Secretary Mike Huebsch said Thursday in a statement. "We are moving forward with the two natural gas boilers and we will be studying the alternatives for meeting the campus need for steam into the future."

Sierra Club raps Walker

The Sierra Club and Rep. Brett Hulsey (D-Madison) said the move marks a pattern by Walker to halt or restrict clean-energy and green projects, including high-speed rail and wind power development.

"Governor Walker has not met a clean, green job that he didn't want to kill," said Hulsey, who has worked on biomass projects as an environmental consultant. "Cutting this project destroys an entire new emerging clean energy market in Wisconsin where farmers would grow biofuel on their land that would otherwise go to waste or be imported from elsewhere."

"Just like those decisions, canceling the biomass project cancels an opportunity to keep our money local and develop our local economy," said Jennifer Feyerherm of the Sierra Club.

Plale said the engineering and construction consortium hired to build the project, Boldt-AMEC, would remain on the job but that the task ahead for the consortium would be revised. The state had not yet placed an order to buy the biomass boiler, he said.

While supporters of the project touted the plant as a symbol of the state's commitment to building a cleaner energy economy - and the ripple effect in job creation for a biomass supply chain - critics raised questions about whether there would be enough biomass available to supply the facility.

The project is the second biomass project to be canceled in the state in the past two months.

In late November, Xcel Energy dropped plans to build a biomass gasification plant on Lake Superior in Ashland because the cost of the project had risen 37% from its initial forecast.

We Energies is continuing to pursue a $255 million biomass plant at the Domtar Corp. paper mill in Rothschild. That project faces a vote by state regulators in the next four to six weeks.

***

Coming Sunday

With the demise of biomass power plant projects in Ashland and Madison, there's one major project still on the drawing board - We Energies' proposed $255 million plant near Wausau.