Pennsylvania Judges Say Line Not Needed

Dear Citizen,

Pennsylvania judges say line is not needed. See articles in CNN Money, Pittsburgh Tribune, NVDaily, Winchester Star.

The transmission line report and recommendation from Pennsylvania is both transparent and thoughtful. The two Administrative Law Judges looked at big picture, small picture, history, credibility, and motive. Here are some of their findings:

It's All About the Money: "The costs and adverse impacts of the [transmission line] clearly outweigh the benefits of it. We are convinced that the project is driven by economics and not by reliability violations" pg. 112
Alternatives Not Examined: "Non-transmission solutions to the alleged reliability issues, such as conservation, demand-side management, the effect of potential carbon caps on demand, and distributed generation, were not studied by TrAILCo." pg. 31
Line Is Not Needed: "If the Commission does not step back and look at this project outside of the narrow confines of the transmission planning process, in a broader contest, it cannot truly determine whether there is a "need". The Commission must examine the transmission planning process and the modeled reliability problems along with the generation planning process, alternative energy initiatives, demand side management, environmental impacts, and the costs and benefits (both monetary and non-monetary) of the project in order to effectively assess the "need." " pg. 81
The Human Impact Matters: "The people and property owners of Greene County who testified at public input hearings and site views last year are not "self-interested NIMBY's." These people have done and will continue to do their part for the "public need." They just object to having everything in their backyards. They know all about coal-fired power plants, coal mines, smokestacks, slag dumps, coal patches and shanties. These people live with the pollution and waste generated by coal mining and coal-fired electric power generation. Needless to say, we do not condone baseless ad hominem assertions in this proceeding." pg. 111
The Modeling is Flawed: "In layman's terms, the RTEP modeling process used by PJM is an overly conservative, belt-and-suspenders approach to transmission system planning" pg. 115
It's All About Coal: "the true impetus for the 502-Loudoun segment is to transport cheaper coal-fired generation from western PJM to eastern PJM and to encourage the siting of new generation in western PJM where it may be more palatable." pg. 234

Download the Pennsylvania Recommendation (18MB)

The findings in Pennsylvania go hand in hand with everything we have said in Virginia for the past two years. This is in part due to PEC's efforts to provide information and support early on to citizen groups and land trusts in Pennsylvania. Congratulations and thank you to Stop the Towers, the Energy Conservation Council (ECC), and the Pennsylvania Land Trust Association.

Allegheny Power is "extremely disappointed" by the recommendation and will be pushing hard for the line to be approved by the full Pennsylvania Commission. But it'll be hard to build a line from point A to point B, if point A is no longer on the table.

Best,

Bri West
Piedmont Environmental Council
bwest@pecva.org
1-540-347-2334

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