Word: matep
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University officials don't like to talk about the Medical Area Total Energy Plant (MATEP). The story of the power plant is one of interminable delay, confusing environmental issues, strained community relations and page upon page of complicated and very dull data. But the bottom line is very simple: what once seemed like a great idea has gradually become an administrative and financial disaster...
...power plant goes "on line" next week for the first time when it starts to privde chilled water and steam heat to some of the 13 institutions in the Medical Area it is designed to serve. But MATEP won't be churning out the thousands of kilowatts in electricity that it must produce to be cost-and energy-efficient. Designed to replace the ancient (circa 1909) facility which has serviced the Medical Area for 20 years longer than it should have, the key to the new plant is cogeneration--its ability to produce three types of power from one central...
...rates have driven the price of the plant, originally estimated at $40 million, to about $200 million. The power plant was originally slated to save $2 million in its first year of operation, but given strict environmental operating conditions and delays, Thomas O'Brien, financial vice president, now says MATEP won't save money for at least six or seven years...
...government relations says, "tax credits have a very hard time in the Ways and Means Committee." The University lobbied hard for the proposal but eventually it died. "We were running against a very strong current," Coddington explains, adding, "it was not just somebody taking aim at Harvard or at MATEP...
...surface, however, officials continue stoically to predict success. O'Brien insists that Harvard is not developing an alternate electricity-generating plan, one that is not based on installing the diesel engines. Rising oil prices, he says, will eventually help oil-efficient MATEP pay for itself faster. Joe B. Wyatt, vice president for administration, says the power plant's rising costs are similar to problems with the Seabrook and Pilgrim II nuclear power plants. "The initial estimate has practically no bearing on the costs because of the environmental questions," he says, but adds that he is optimistic the project will succeed...