Bob Lazaro
PEC Director of Communications
571.225.0198

For Immediate Release

U.S. Senate Committee To Hold Hearing on Transmission Legislation
PEC Concerned This Will Lead to More Coal

Environmental Organizations Send Letter Outlining Concerns

(Warrenton, VA - March 11, 2009) The U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources will conduct a hearing tomorrow (Thursday, March 12) at 9:30 AM to take testimony regarding legislation related to transmission lines. One bill was introduced by Senate Majority Leader Reid (D-Nevada).

The Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC) continues to express its deep concerns that the proposed bills, which propose to expedite so-called "Green" transmission, would result in more greenhouse gases, not less.

Specific concerns are:

1. The statutes are not tied to any limit on greenhouse gas. If either bill were passed as currently drafted, there would be a massive expansion of the grid with no corresponding requirement for renewable generation. The new grid would fill up with the cheapest electricity -- coal.

2. The statutes represent a massive experiment in expanding the grid. This expansion would be presided over by private groups with no local and minimal national oversight.

3. If the only feasible political approach is to pass one of these massive bills, then improve the bills with these minimal steps: require that each project approved as part of the Green Transmission Grid be measured against either a state, regional or federal integrated resource plan; institute environmental dispatch and limit the new lines to renewable resources.

PEC successfully sued the Federal Energy Regulatory Council (FERC) in the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond regarding FERC's overreaching interpretation of transmission siting regulations. PEC is also a part to litigation to overturn the Department of Energy's designation of millions of acres of land in the West and East as National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors.

A number of environmental organizations including PEC have signed on to a letter expressing concerns regarding the legislative proposals. In the letter the groups state, "Transmission policy reform must result in new lines that serve clean renewable resources, rather than expanding the carbon-intensive power generation that currently accounts for more than 40 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and contributes to the continued deterioration of air quality in the country's most vulnerable communities. Piecemeal energy policy -- especially electric transmission policy reform -- in advance of a comprehensive national climate regime can have the real but unintended effect of facilitating more, not less, greenhouse gas pollution. For example, recent projects proposed in Pennsylvania and Virginia billed as renewable lines would ultimately result in significant new or expanded remote coal generation."

Read the letter

The hearing can be viewed on webcast: http://energy.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.Nowebcast