A partnership with private industry to test hydroelectric power in the Mississippi River has gained new endorsements from Vicksburg and Warren County governing boards.

Free Flow Power Corp. is vying for $750,000 from the Mississippi Development Authority for a pilot project to sink energy-generating turbines in the river near Vicksburg, retired Army Brig. Gen. Robert Crear said Monday. The former commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Mississippi Valley Division is a member of Free Flow’s board of directors.

Letters of support from local government were sought to add to the firm’s proposal.

“It’s a win in terms of having renewable energy for our country so that we’re not dependent on imported oil,” Crear said, adding the company hopes to manufacture some of the turbines planned for the Lower Mississippi in Vicksburg or somewhere “in this vicinity.”

“My personal goal is to make Mississippi a leader in hydrokinetics and alternative energy — and also, by doing that, to make Vicksburg a leader, as well,” said Crear, who also appeared before the city board to request the letter.

Shortly after his election in June, Mayor Paul Winfield said he was open to some type of partnership with a private development to reap financial benefits of a river turbine, an idea first mentioned in the final months of the Leyens administration. On Monday, Winfield’s comments remained supportive.

“This is unique and exciting technology,” Winfield said.  “Most of us in the city of Vicksburg know that we haven’t utilized our river to its fullest potential. This is an excellent way to do it, through this type of green technology.”

No financial commitments from local governments are part of the MDA grant. Crear told supervisors the firm was open to talking about selling portions of electricity to local governments, preferably later in the federal permitting process.

Free Flow, based in Glou-cester, Mass., with offices in New Orleans, New York and Bellingham, Wash., is one of two turbine developers who have applied to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to use river currents to spin turbines and make about 20 kilowatts of electricity — not enough to serve an entire city, but perhaps enough to supplement an existing power grid. Crear acknowledged the capacity by itself “is not much power,” but a test of one turbine in Vicksburg via the pilot project “would show the technology works.”

The stimulus-derived, alternative energy grant should be awarded in March and would pay 75 percent of costs to sink a turbine near a riverside industry, with the company picking up 25 percent, Crear said. Free Flow is in talks with two companies with “riverside frontage” for access to the river, Crear said. Construction would take six months and would create 10 new jobs, according to the pending letter to MDA. The company has received $1.4 million in green technology stimulus funds from the Department of Energy for similar pilot projects elsewhere.

“I think it’s great,” District 4 Supervisor Bill Lauderdale said. “I’ve always thought that river was just sitting there waiting for us to tap it. I’m just excited to see this going.”

Full licensing is expected by 2012 for turbines proposed at 55 sites on the Mississippi south of St. Louis. Two are situated in Warren County, near the Brunswick community and another south of Vicksburg near Davis Island. Turbines are placed or suspended in the stream below the navigation channel to avoid interference from shipping, with the pilot project to be placed on a floatable mount, Crear said.

Issaquena County has an agreement with Louisiana-based MARMC Enterprises to share power sales from a pair of 5-megawatt turbines proposed in the river near Fitler Bend and Addie. Revenue estimates on those sites and Free Flow’s are speculative, though officials in Issaquena have quoted figures in the millions.

A third turbine developer Hydro Green Energy, plans two turbines on the Tennessee-Tombigbee River after permits secured last year for Vicksburg and Vidalia, La., were surrendered and plans shifted. The company had met with Vicksburg officials before municipal elections in June on a turbine partnership to lower the cost of the city’s energy spending on its infrastructure, as had Free Flow.

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Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com