Gypsum’s biomass plant has closed, apparently permanently, leaving facility’s future in doubt
Owners say they intend to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy on the facility
Vail Daily archive photo
Gypsum’s Eagle Valley Clean Energy Biomass Plant has closed, apparently for good.
The news came to employees on Tuesday. In an April 16 email to Gypsum Town Manager Jeremy Rietmann, Paola Cadau, vice president of operations for wind for Greenbacker Capital, which owns the facility, wrote that the company had made the “difficult decision that it is no longer financially viable for us to continue operations.”
Cadau’s email adds that Greenbacker Capital plans to “cease operations and file for bankruptcy under Chapter) 7 of the bankruptcy code shortly.”
Chapter 7 bankruptcy provides for “liquidation” 鈥� the sale of a debtor’s nonexempt property and distribution of the proceeds to creditors.
The closure apparently brings to an end a story that began in 2012 when town officials approved the annexation of a 94-acre parcel into town. The plan was to burn beetle-killed timber, providing electricity to the Holy Cross Energy electric grid.
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A fire in 2014 idled the plant for several months. Even as the plant settled into normal operation, the town and the original owners, Utah-based Evergreen Clean Energy, were embroiled in litigation and the town attempted to condemn the property.
Greenbacker’s 2019 acquisition of the plant ended the litigation. Greenbacker and the town began negotiations on town acquisition of property on the north side of the Eagle River for open space uses.
Cadau’s April 16 email indicates that the effort has now ended. That’s unfortunate, Rietmann said, because many of the details of the land donation had been fleshed out.
Rietmann said town officials have a lot more investigation to do in the wake of the plant’s closure.
“We’ll watch the bankruptcy proceedings,” he said, to see if there are any opportunities for the town to acquire the property.
If another entity comes in and acquires the facility at a bargain-basement price, what are the implications for the town, Rietmann asked. And, if the facility is permanently closed, “What does the community do with a big, vacant industrial facility with no purpose?”
Holy Cross Energy will also be keeping a close eye on the bankruptcy proceedings. In an email, Holy Cross CEO Bryan Hannegan wrote that the electric cooperative doesn’t have any immediate interest in the facility. It was the most expensive renewable energy in the cooperative’s portfolio.
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Hannegan added that the biomass facility as of 2022 provided 7% of Holy Cross’s energy needs. The facility in 2023 received 4.8% of its energy from the biomass plant.
In an email, White River National Forest Public Information Officer David Boyd wrote: “We are disappointed to hear this news as Eagle Valley Clean Energy has been providing a key local market for our contractors who remove woody biomass from the White River National Forest. Much of the vegetation we treat is not commercially marketable for traditional timber use, which has created challenges for us in contracting important forest health and wildfire fuel reduction projects. We are currently assessing the impact of the biomass plant’s closure on our anticipated projects.”
