Buckeye Water used for proposed plant

By D.A. Wilkinson

The Ohio River will provide water for the facilities.

LISBON — The Buckeye Water District in Wellsville will continue providing water to the Federal Correctional Institution in Elkton and begin doing so for the proposed Baard Energy plant that would turn coal into liquid fuel.

Troy Graft of the Columbiana County engineer’s office told county commissioners Wednesday the agreement with the prison and Buckeye calls for the water district to provide 118 million gallons of water a year to the facility for the next 10 years. According to Vindicator files, Buckeye began providing water to the federal prison in early 2007.

When the prison was built in the 1990s, the city of Salem provided the water. Salem gets its water from surface collections that end up in Cold Run Reservoir.

When the prison contract expired, Salem wanted to bid directly to supply the water. But county officials said they controlled water distribution outside cities.

Al DeAngelis, water district manager, said the district’s board had just reached an agreement to provide water to the proposed Baard plant if it becomes a reality. Buckeye gets its water from the Ohio River. Terms of the agreement were not available Wednesday.

The proposed plant with an estimated cost of $5 billion would turn coal and other materials into 50,000 barrels of jet and diesel fuel a day.

The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency will have the last public hearing on the overall impact of the plant at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Wellsville High School. People can make comments, but no decision will be made at the meeting, EPA officials have said.

If the plant is approved, Buckeye will have to build new waterlines to the Baard facility, DeAngelis said.

The plant will draw 21 million gallons of untreated water a day for use in processing the coal, he added.

Buckeye also will provide 3 million gallons a day of processed water that would be used for various purposes, and another 250,000 gallons a day of drinking water.

Salem did not lose out in terms of adding more customers, however.

Don Weingart, the Salem Utilities Department, said the city began to provide water to Leetonia on Aug. 14. The village is receiving about 175,000 to 200,000 gallons of water a day from the city.

wilkinson@vindy.com