RED-Rochester Power and Eastman Business Park (Kodak)
Eastman Business Park is home to manufacturing, tenant and site infrastructure facilities, with several facilities currently for sale and/or lease, along with space for new buildings and development. Kodak currently has 2.5M sq. ft. of existing facility space of virtually all types, and over 300 acres of developable property for commercial or industrial use. Kodak operated for years out of this facility.
Over 100 companies are located onsite that employ over 6,000 people, many of them responsible for the development of our nation’s next generation technologies that are focused on energy storage, chemical manufacturing, roll-to-roll manufacturing and photonics.
The immense manufacturing infrastructure includes private utilities and onsite water and wastewater management systems. This adds up to a significant competitive advantage for several high-use tenants.
RED-Rochester provides Eastman Business Park with a full suite of utilities using the power of Tri-Generation. High pressure steam from utility-grade boilers is used to “co-generate” electricity before distributing steam at different pressure levels, and is also used to “tri-generate” refrigeration for process and comfort cooling. Powering the site as a whole makes Eastman Business Park twice as efficient as a standard public utility. The versatility provided by the RED-Rochester utilities plant allows a variety of businesses from many different industries to find a home in Rochester.
Eastman Business Park is truly an innovation hub and manufacturing powerhouse in Rochester, a community that was devastated by the economic impact of Kodak’s decline over the past two decades. It is a true facility overhaul and renaissance that is a key driver behind the rebirth of manufacturing in the Rochester, New York region. Victory Energy is proud to have been a key element of Rochester’s industrial revitalization.
$75 Million Plant Conversion – Coal to Natural Gas – Two-Year Window
The Eastman Business Park/RED-Rochester facility needed to be in compliance with Federal Boiler-MACT regulations. This required replacing or converting existing coal-fired boilers to natural gas. There were several key milestones that needed to be achieved:
- Completely coal free operation
- CO2 emissions reduction by 50%
- NOx and particulate reduction by over half
- 762,000 PPH of HP Superheated steam
- Maximum Superheat turndown flexibility
- Operational by early 2018
This was a significant effort as coal had burned at the Eastman Kodak facility for well over 100 years. The boilers were in place when 60,000 people were working in the plant. At its peak in the 1990’s, Eastman Business Park was capable of generating close to 3 million pounds of steam and 200 megawatts – enough to power over 200,000 homes.
The new boiler house needed to be properly sized for the current load requirements for users/tenants in the industrial park and allow room for significant growth in new economy industries that would call the park home in the future.
The Victory Energy Solution – Our Role
The Victory Energy “concept to completion” core business promise was an integral factor in allowing RED-Rochester to meet all their aggressive project milestones. Our involvement spanned from initial bidder’s meetings to being onsite when the boilers were delivered in the dead of night.
A hallmark of working with Victory Energy is close engagement with all project stakeholders – in this case ESI, the EPC Construction Partner ─ as well as with all internal RED-Rochester/Eastman Business Park engineering and operations influences. The fluctuating user requirements of all the current tenants made for challenging product solutions which required flexibility and on-going revisions. Users appreciated the willingness of Victory Energy to work closely to understand their project needs. They understood that Victory Energy was looking out for the best interests of all constituents involved in the project.
The Product Solution:
• Three 254,000 Pound Per Hour Industrial Boilers (Natural Gas) weighing more than 270,000 Pounds
The engineering time that went into the final approved product design was considerable. Where other boiler manufacturers delivered a “stock product” solution, Victory Energy recommended a tailored product configuration that uniquely fit the diverse and demanding needs for all the users (both existing and high potential new industries) at the Eastman Business Park. All this was achieved at an extremely competitive offering.
The project experienced delays in achieving project go-ahead approval. The EPC recommended reversing the normal installation and construction steps to allow for the system to be in full operation by 2018. Victory Energy worked closely with the EPC to redesign the system layout. These changes allowed for installation of the fan, ductwork and stack prior to the boiler arriving on site. With the complex ductwork arrangements and a new scope split that moved structural support steel into the EPC scope, the in-house 3D modeling and CFD capabilities of Victory Energy were instrumental. These tools allowed optimization of the flue gas flow path and closer alignment between the EPC and Victory Energy.
The challenge of keeping the boiler delivery schedule on time was a continual factor that was faced throughout the project. Early delays have the potential to pose significant hurdles for manufacturers. The response is often manifested in delivery postponements. Victory Energy never takes this easy way out. Our Concept to Completion culture always looks for a way to meet and exceed customer expectations. Based on the immense amount of manufacturing and procurement standardization, the product was delivered according to schedule requirements – one that featured the superior fit and finish that are trademarks of a Victory Energy product.
One of the most critically important roles that Victory Energy provided was the actual delivery of the boiler system. The transportation of the boiler came under the management and guidance of our in-house logistics team. The boiler journey to Rochester spanned 7 states and covered 1,200 miles while having to navigate over a dozen critical bridges. Each of these bridges required evaluation by civil engineers to ensure maximum safety in order to gain approval from each state. This close coordination with representatives of each individual state is a hallmark of the commitment that Victory Energy brings to every logistics challenge.