Location Chosen as Site for NY Recycling Mill

A Kingston, N.Y., company plans to build a $680 million newsprint-recycling mill and power plant -- the largest development project in city history -- at the soon-to-be-shuttered BASF Corp. site.

Earlier this week officials from Besicorp-Empire Development Co. LLC declared their intention to build the 300-worker plant before, according to an article in The Times Union .

Besicorp Development Inc.'s president, William Seils, said the proposal would meet or exceed state environmental standards.

Ned Sullivan, executive director of Poughkeepsie-based Scenic Hudson, the article continued, has yet to give the proposal a thorough vetting. But he said he was happy that the company is working on a brownfield and said the location appears better than others that Besicorp abandoned in Ulster County. Sullivan said he has met with Seils but did not discuss the project in depth.

Besicorp has pledged to work with environmental groups and others. The company plans "open houses'' starting next month to address issues.

Besicorp would like to start building in June 2002, with construction to last about 18 months. When finished, the plant annually will turn 366,000 metric tons of old newspapers and magazines into 300,000 metric tons of recycled newsprint. The power plant would generate 475 megawatts, about 435 megawatts of which would be sold on the open market. The rest would power the newsprint mill.

Earlier this year, Besicorp dropped plans to build the plant in Ulster County after facing zoning difficulties there.

According to Empire Newsprint, when complete, the facility will produce 8 percent of the newsprint consumed in the regional market. Further, letters of intent to support the project and/or purchase supply from the mill are in place from The New York Newspaper Publishers Association, as well as The New York Times, Gannett, Dow Jones, Advance Publications and the Los Angeles Times.

Financing for the facility will be reached using taxable and tax-exempt bonds, along with private financing. Further, the State of New York's Office of Recycling Market Development confirmed a $400,000 technical assistance grant to the project for this year.