MIOSHA Signing Partnership for Lansing Project
The signing will take place Oct. 14 at the site of the Lansing Board of Water & Light’s $182 million REO Town Plant Electric-Steam Generation Facility.
Representatives of The Christman Company, the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs, and the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) will be on hand to sign a partnership Oct. 14 at the site where the Lansing Board of Water & Light's REO Town Plant Electric-Steam Generation Facility is under construction. The partnership's goal is enhanced safety and health awareness and zero injuries for workers on the $182 million construction project, which began in earnest after the groundbreaking last month.
It will be BWL's first natural gas-fired energy generating plant, generating up to 100 megawatts of electricity and creating steam via the cogeneration process that will serve 225 customers in and around downtown Lansing, according to the utility. Once the new plant begins operating in July 2013, it will cut current greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent and allow BWL to decommission its existing coal-fired plant. BWL will avoid burning 139,000 tons of coal each year as a result, cutting air pollutants such as mercury and compounds of sulfur and nitrogen.
The project is utilizing an "auger-cast" method for installing more than 900 concrete pilings. Vertical holes are drilled down to bedrock –- about 45 feet -– and the 1-foot-wide concrete columns are inserted, rather than using pile driving to ram them home. BWL said the auger-cast method will dramatically reduce noise and vibration.
Signing the partnership will be Don Staley, safety manager for The Christman Company; Jay Smith, the contractor's senior vice president and safety director; LARA Deputy Director Steve Arwood; MIOSHA Director Doug Kalinowski; and J. Peter Lark, BWL's general manager.