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Ze-gen Inc. will halt operations at its New Bedford pilot facility when a permit for the facility runs out in September, but is exploring the possibility of re-filing for the permit to continue using the plant, a company official said.
Since October 2007, the Boston-based company has used the pilot plant to test the conversion of waste materials into synthesis gas, or syngas.
Ze-gen officials have been discussing the idea of closing the plant to focus attention on the company’s first commercial project – a proposed $15 million gasification plant in Attleboro.
But there may still be some use for the New Bedford facility, said Gideon Gradman, vice president of corporate development at Ze-gen.
“We’re exploring the potential to continue testing there, but we have not yet filed permits to that effect,” Gradman said. “We see value in continuing to have an R&D option.”
Gradman said the company’s permit from the state Department of Environmental Protection runs out in September, though he didn’t have a specific date. The company has been permitted to work with a number of waste materials, including old wooden rail ties, other treated wood, construction debris and source-separated plastics.
Ze-gen plans to take what it’s learned during three years in New Bedford and apply it to the proposed 7-megawatt plant at the Attleboro Corporate Campus industrial park. The plant would be the first commercial facility of its kind in Massachusetts, according to the company.
The plan is to use waste feedstocks — mainly rail ties — to produce syngas. The gas would then be burned to generate electricity and heat, which could be sold to businesses at the industrial park.
Part of the project financing would come from the company’s $25.6 million Series B round earlier this year, according to Gradman. The goal is to start construction by year’s end and have the plant finished by the close of 2011.
Gradman said Ze-gen is filing an environmental impact report this week with the state as part of a review of the Attleboro project under the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act.
“We are not required to file under MEPA, but we did that voluntarily for transparency,” he said.
Company executives say the plant could save 44,000 tons of waste from reaching landfills every year, and the process would create less pollution and lower emissions than energy production from fossil fuels. The plant could create up to 150 construction jobs and would employ 20 to 25 people permanently, according to the firm.
Founded in 2004, Ze-gen has received roughly $29 million in two rounds of venture funding, along with a $500,000 financing from the quasi-public Massachusetts Technology Collaborative.
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