Baileyville mill deal outcome in question

BAILEYVILLE – A deal for a Kennebunk waste-to-energy company to occupy the former Louisiana-Pacific mill appears to be up in the air.

Damar Dore, who holds the option on the former L-P mill, said Tuesday that negotiations with Baetel Corp. have “ceased.”

But a Baetel spokesman had a different take on the negotiations on Tuesday.

“At this point we can’t comment on anything pertaining to this project. It is too early to say what is happening with it. I don’t know where you heard that,” Baetel’s Gregg Dinino said, referring to the negotiations having been halted. “As far as we are concerned, it is still alive. That is all I can say at this point.”

When told that it was Dore who had said that negotiations had ended, Dinino said: “Interesting. I don’t have anything to say about that. At this point all I am saying is it remains a possibility.”

L-P shut down its oriented strand board manufacturing operations at the plant in 2005, and the facility has been idle since then. The company continues to manufacture laminated strand board at its mill in Houlton. Dore said that he and his backers continue to move forward with purchasing the facility. “We are ready to buy,” he said.

Asked for an update on how negotiations with Dore were going, an L-P spokeswoman said Tuesday that as far as she knew things had not changed since she last spoke with the Bangor Daily News in August. At that time, L-P said company policy forbade her from commenting on ongoing negotiations.

Dore said that Baetel was only one of the proposed companies his group was talking to about occupying the building, but declined to elaborate. He said an announcement is planned for later this year.

In August, Baetel announced that it had entered into a joint venture agreement with St. Croix Green Energy LLC to redevelop the mill for use in electrical generation, fuel production, and the development of a green business and energy park, according to a statement on the company’s Web site.

Dore said in August that St. Croix Green Energy was no longer in the picture, but did say he was the chief executive officer of the newly formed Sunrise Energy Systems LLC, the company that holds the option on the building.

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