Construction of a 280,000-square-foot solar-panel manufacturing plant on Barnum Road at Devens may begin as early as September 1, officials learned Tuesday morning at an event to introduce the Marlborough-based company to the Devens Enterprise Commission (DEC).
In anticipation of filing an application with DEC, Richard M. Feldt, the chairman and president of Evergreen Solar, Inc., introduced his company to DEC members and described plans to build the plant on lot 2, Barnum Road, a 22-acre parcel adjacent to Media News and across from the Army maintenance facility. The schedule Feldt presented anticipated starting site work on the building September 1, pending DEC’s approval of its plan. A groundbreaking ceremony with Governor Deval Patrick is scheduled for September 12, said Feldt. Move-ins of its various manufacturing components would begin in mid-February 2008, and the facility would be performing at full capacity by early 2009, he said. Assuming the success of the initial plant, Feldt said, construction of a second building would begin 9 to 12 months after completion of Phase 1.
Evergreen Solar manufactures photovoltaic wafers, cells, and solar panels. Its process integrates manufacturing at one location, lowering the costs of the components, said Feldt. Among Feldt’s goals for the company, he said, is establishing grid parity with N-Star, which necessitates reducing the installed cost of solar power by almost half.
Feldt responded to questions regarding air quality, discharge, water use, and solid waste such as aluminum paste and silver, which will be removed from the site. There will be no air emissions to speak of, according to an Evergreen representative; “It is like a simplified semiconductor factory,” he explained.
Peter Lowitt, DEC’s land use director, said that a noise study will be done. Heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning equipment will be installed inside the building, not on the roof, and although there will be solar panels on the roof, the plant will run on “regular” electricity, Feldt said.
Feldt praised the governor and Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs Ian Bowles, who he described as interested, helpful, and engaged in keeping Evergreen Solar’s expansion within the state and finding a suitable site. Feldt said that the state would contribute about $23 million to the project, which is expected to create 300 to 350 jobs.
Noting that Evergreen’s plan fulfills Devens’s purpose of “creating jobs and sustainable development in an environmentally friendly way,” DEC Chairman William Marshall said he hoped the company’s presence at Devens would be “hugely successful.”
DEC is a one-stop permitting authority for development on Devens composed of 12 gubernatorial appointees; Ayer, Harvard, and Shirley nominate six of them. They act on all applications “in less than 75 days” and “many are completed in only 45 days,” according to the DEC website.
