An ad hoc Biomass Power Plant Task Force wants to fund a feasibility study for a cogeneration plant in the West End that burns mill wood waste.

The first step, however, is raising $100,000 to pay for the study.

This week, members of the task force continued lobbying a variety of city and county agencies to pony up a total of $50,000.

If the cash is raised, then task force members — who include Rod Fleck, Forks city planner/attorney, and John Calhoun, Port of Port Angeles commissioner — plan to ask for a matching grant from the state Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development.

So far, the Port of Port Angeles and the Clallam County Public Utility District have been asked to provide $17,500 each, while Clallam County is being asked for $10,000 and the city of Forks $5,000.

If funded, the feasibility study will look at the costs involved in building a bioenergy plant that produces energy by eating up woody debris, including waste from the West End’s cedar mills.

Deadline urgency

The task force was created out of a sense of urgency caused by federal air quality regulations that take effect Friday.

That deadline will prohibit Clallam and Jefferson counties’ 11 cedar mills — most of the in the West End — from burning cedar waste into the atmosphere.