Well, hey now, what's that noise? Is it a herd of elephants thundering through private property across the west?
This lovely article says:
This lovely article says:
John Arnold, a billionaire from Houston, is making a big bet on modernizing the outdated transmission infrastructure in the United States to transport electricity to areas where it is needed, including the distribution of wind and solar energy to towns and cities nationwide for the clean-energy transition.
Arnold told Bloomberg he has invested "several hundred million dollars" into Houston-based Grid United, a company he co-founded with transmission line developer Michael Skelly, to purchase land, easements, and the necessary permits for constructing electric highways that can stretch hundreds of miles.
Mikey's got a new sugar daddy! You might be wondering how he found another mark to give him a couple hundred million dollars to play transmission. If you figure it out, let me know.
Here's the plan:
Here's the plan:
Arnold and Skelly are planning long-haul transmission lines across multiple states on private land that might be very difficult to achieve because failing to win over every landowner could quickly scuttle the entire project.
"We are trying to break this chicken and egg cycle by acquiring the land position first."
How do you acquire the land first if you're honest with landowners about what you intend to do? If they want to sell their land, they'll do it. And if they don't, they won't, no matter how "early" you plan to hustle them. Does Skelly think he can sneak up on landowners and acquire their "land position" before telling them he plans to build a ginormous overhead transmission line on it? That's about as subtle as a herd of elephants. The landowners aren't stupid. That was Skelly's problem last time... he thought landowners were "just a bunch of farmers" that he could easily bamboozle. And the next thing you know, he'd pissed away $200M of investor's money and his company folded. Good times!
Maybe Skelly doesn't know that eminent domain exists for a reason? It is so that land can be acquired for public use, particularly for long, linear infrastructure that requires the buy-in from hundreds or thousands of landowners. There's bound to be a fly or two thousand in the ointment.
And, hey, would you look at that? Skelly is "developing" five new projects, just like last time. It's like throwing spaghetti on the wall and hoping a few pieces stick. Didn't work last time. It just wasted a whole bunch of money that could have gone to better use.
And what do either of these yahoos know about where power is "needed"? Their knowledge thimble may be only half full.
You'd think after his last spectacular transmission failure Skelly would have learned at least something... like burying transmission on existing highway rights of way is faster and cheaper and doesn't require any landowner participation.
How much money is going to be wasted this time? Keep your ear to the ground... there may be a herd of elephants approaching.
Maybe Skelly doesn't know that eminent domain exists for a reason? It is so that land can be acquired for public use, particularly for long, linear infrastructure that requires the buy-in from hundreds or thousands of landowners. There's bound to be a fly or two thousand in the ointment.
And, hey, would you look at that? Skelly is "developing" five new projects, just like last time. It's like throwing spaghetti on the wall and hoping a few pieces stick. Didn't work last time. It just wasted a whole bunch of money that could have gone to better use.
And what do either of these yahoos know about where power is "needed"? Their knowledge thimble may be only half full.
You'd think after his last spectacular transmission failure Skelly would have learned at least something... like burying transmission on existing highway rights of way is faster and cheaper and doesn't require any landowner participation.
How much money is going to be wasted this time? Keep your ear to the ground... there may be a herd of elephants approaching.
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