FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 20, 2008
For More Information:
Robert Lazaro, PEC, Director of Communications
571.225.0198

PEC Files Post Hearing Brief in Opposition to Transmission Line

Power Company Profits, not Reliability, Drive Request for Line

(Warrenton, VA) Piedmont Environmental Council in a brief filed this week with the Virginia State Corporation Commission explained that Dominion's proposed billion-dollar high-voltage power line across historic Northern Virginia is not needed for reliable electric service and should not be authorized.

"Stripped of its reliability and national security pretenses," explained PEC, the so-called Loudoun line is a "ratepayer-financed opening of lucrative eastern Mid-Atlantic markets to Dominion," its partner Allegheny Energy, and "other investors in western predominantly coal-fired generation."

The expert testimony presented by PEC definitively demonstrates that Dominion and Allegheny's proposed high-voltage transmission line is unnecessary and that simple alternatives that have significantly less impact are available to the power companies to meet the electricity needs of Northern Virginia for today and into the future. The testimony filed with the SCC revealed that Dominion and Allegheny:

• Ignored less costly and less environmentally damaging solutions;
• Misrepresented the need for the proposed transmission line as a local Northern Virginia issue rather than as a regional issue;
• Made wildly unrealistic assumptions and used unreliable data in analyzing the needs of Northern Virginia and the greater Mid-Atlantic area; and
• Claimed falsely that the proposed transmission line will benefit consumers, when (as they know) studies show that the line will cost consumers more in the long run.

In its brief to the Commission, Piedmont assailed power line proponents for faulty forecasting of demand for power and available future sources of supply. Forecasted demand was exaggerated by the proponents ignoring Commonwealth and regional programs to increase energy efficiency and reduce demand, particularly during periods of peak consumption. Those programs are prescribed in the energy legislation that the Commonwealth enacted in 2007, Governor Kaine's Energy Plan, and the energy plans of neighboring states, but were modeled by the Loudoun line proponents as having absolutely no effect on the future demand for power.

At the same time, projected future supply was seriously understated, said PEC. Successful programs such as PJM's new electric capacity market that rewards investments in new power supply capacity, as well as demand management and reduction, were ignored in order to make the case in favor of the proposed Loudoun line, which proponents contend may be needed for reliability reasons as early as 2011. "If the service reliability need for 2011 were real," asked PEC's President Christopher Miller, "then why is Dominion postponing the in-service dates of generating plants that are being developed close to demand centers in eastern PJM?"

Based upon the testimony filed with the State Corporation Commission PEC and other parties are requesting that Commission reject the Dominion/Allegheny application in that:

1. Uncontested evidence demonstrates the Loudoun line does not work. Futhermore, the line is unnecessary if the Allegheny-AEP Kemptown line goes into service as planned in 2012, an eventuality that neither applicant or PJM studied.
2. The Loudoun line does not advance the security of the National Capital Region (NCR). The line compromises security by making the NCR more dependent on remote coal fired generation to the west and long distance high-voltage transmission vulnerable to cascading outages and sabotage.
3. Loudoun line is unnecessary because simulated reliability violations are the product of highly unlikely multiple contingencies and baseline assumptions as to future loads, generation and demand side management that are unreasonable, unjustifiable, and, in the case of demand side management, contrary to Federal and Commonwealth policy.

PEC is committed to promoting sensible energy policies at the local, state and federal levels of government. For more information, visit www.enlightenva.org.

Download a pdf copy of PEC's brief filed with the SCC.