BANGOR (AP) – The renewed availability of federal tax credits to promote alternative energy production is being welcomed by developers and industry advocates in Maine.

Evergreen Wind Power LLC, a firm seeking to build 33 wind turbines on Mars Hill Mountain in Aroostook County, had staked its prospects for the $68 million project on tax assistance and now should be able to break ground by late spring, according to Peter Gish, a spokesman for Evergreen’s parent company, UPC Wind Partners.

Gish said company officials were optimistic.

“All indications are that there is a good appetite in the banking market right now,” he said.

A second wind project proposed for western Maine is a potential beneficiary of federal assistance and Maine also has nine biomass plants that could get a boost.

Morrill Worchester, who owns a biomass plant in Deblois, says he has struggled to keep profitable for 11 years and in that time has shut down and restarted the plant five times.

He said Tuesday his latest effort to bring the plant back on line might not have been feasible without the tax credit.

“This basically put us over the top and made it so our whole operation will be very solid,” Worchester said.

He said the plant employs nearly 50 people and provides income for more than 100 loggers who supply the brush and waste wood that fuels the plant.

To qualify, companies must have their plants operational by the close of 2005. If the deadline is met, a company is guaranteed the tax break for 10 years for wind power and for five years for biomass power.

The biomass industry grew as an energy production alternative during the oil price spikes of the 1970s and 80s, but has struggled to compete with oil- and gas-fueled plants over the past decade.

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