LIVERMORE FALLS – A federal tax credit for biomass and wind energy generating plants could be good news for small, rural towns in Maine, say people in the industry.

The federal Jumpstart Our Business Strength Bill, which includes energy production tax credits for renewable energy facilities such as biomass and wind generators was approved by the U.S. Senate this week. The bill now goes to conference between the House of Representatives and the Senate.

The energy tax credit provisions, if they stay intact, would give biomass production a tax credit of 1.2 cents per kilowatt hour and a wind production credit of 1.8 cents an hour.

That has the potential to help keep biomass facilities operating in Maine.

Maine has nine stand-alone, grid-scale biomass facilities, including ones in Livermore Falls and in Eustis, and three facilities which haven’t been operating for some time.

A 10th plant, Boralex Athens Energy in Athens was sold last week to Georgia-Pacific Corp., which will not supply electricity to the grid.

Dave Wilby, executive director of Independent Energy Producers of Maine, and Boralex Stratton Energy Manager Steve Hall credited Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe with being instrumental in passage of the bill that is important for the economy in the areas the plants are located. Collins has been working on getting tax credits for biomass energy providers for five years.

“These production tax credits are absolutely essential to the future of Maine’s biomass and wind generators,” Wilby said. “The biomass facilities play a key role in the state’s forest products industry, as they provide a valuable market for wood waste from sawmills and others. In total, the biomass industry supports hundreds of jobs, direct and indirect, throughout Maine.”

A federal production tax credit for “closed loop” biomass plants has been on the books since 1992, but no facility in the country has been able to take advantage of it, Wilby said. A change in the bill before Congress would fix that, he said.

Hall said that Boralex Stratton Energy has the capacity to produce more than 300,000 megawatt hours of electricity a year. Boralex Livermore Falls Energy, a smaller plant, has the capacity to produce about 260,000 megawatt hours of electricity annually.

A federal production tax credit for wind has also been in place since 1992, Wilby said, but Congress hasn’t renewed it since it lapsed in December.

There are two wind developments being proposed in Maine: a 52-megawatt wind farm on Reddington and Black Nubble mountains in Reddington Township in Franklin County and a 50-megawatt facility for Mars Hill in Aroostook County.

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