New Biomass-Fueled Power Plant Near Wausau Is Wrapping Up Construction

Construction should wrap up in a few months on the biomass-fueled power plant being built on the property of a paper mill near Wausau.

On Tuesday, the Department of Natural Resources Board took a bus tour through the construction site of the power plant that Milwaukee-based WE Energies is building, next to the Domtar paper mill in Rothschild. The co-generation plant will provide 50 megawatts of electricity to help WE Energies meet the state’s renewable energy target. Steam and a new natural gas-fueled boiler will help power the mill.

A residential neighborhood is nearby, but WE Energies’ facilities manager Terry Carroll told the board that features like dust collectors where the ground-up wood will be dropped off will help protect the neighbors.

A couple of Domtar neighbors offered differing opinions of the soon to-be finished biomass plant. A man who says he works at Wisconsin Public Service’s coal-fired power plant in Weston says Domtar has been a conscientious neighbor. A woman who has opposed the biomass project says she continues to worry about noise and traffic congestion when the trucks full of chipped wood start rolling into the plant.