It was 20 years ago today…
October 22nd, 2022
EXCELSIOR ENERGY’S MESABA PROJECT
PARTIAL DOCUMENT REPOSITORY
Well, a bit more than 20 years ago… January 15, 2002, just after the start of the legislative session, I was at an energy committee meeting, Senate? House? I think Senate was first, then heard again at House, and the following year they got their legislation through as a part of the 2003 Prairie Island bill.
- The Excelsior Energy link I’m using is compliments of waybackmachine. Note that now, if you plug in “excelsiorenergy.com” it becomes “excelsiorcapital.com (Excelsior Energy Capital).” essentially at a marina at 21960 Minnetonka Blvd.! Related?
Anyway, there was a presentation back in 2002 about the greatest thing since sliced bread (NOT!), a coal gasification project proposed for “somewhere” on the Range. Here’s what they presented:
Note the parts about “brownfield” and “existing infrastructure.” LIES, it’s that simple. Here’s what their site looked like, this was at the DOE and locals site visit in 2005:
Starting in 2005, I was representing “mncoalgasplant,” landowners and residents near the proposed project, joined in tandem by Citizens Against the Mesaba Project (CAMP) (site circa 2013 with live links, thanks waybackmachine!). We had such active folks, every hearing was PACKED, and eventually the project faded, never formally declared dead, but piece by piece, it went away.
HOWEVER, Excelsior Energy did manage to get an save passed by the legislature for a natural gas plant:
Week before last, I picked up files from a cohort who shall remain unnamed, and am scanning in boxes of files, to post here, and recycle hard copies for biomass (UGH, but that’s what Red Wing does. Thanks, Xcel Energy!). I’ll be posting them, some interesting stuff if you’re into energy and political and capital intrigue, some purely inside baseball that no one will care about.
MONEY TRACKING – Spreadsheets and invoices to IRRB for reimbursement
Various Contractor Invoices (some redacted)
What a pain in the patoot that was — TWO ENTIRE WASTEBASKET OF SCANNING!
