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Illinois Court Snatches Away Permit for Grain Belt Express

3/15/2018

1 Comment

 
It's dead folks.  Dead, dead, deader than dead.

This isn't a "casting of doubt" or a "speed bump."  This is the end of Grain Belt Express.

On Tuesday, the 5th District Appellate Court of Illinois "reversed where the Commission lacked the authority to grant a nonpublic utility company a certificate of public convenience and necessity under the expedited review process set forth in the Illinois Public Utilities Act."

If that's not clear as a bell, there's also this:
The order of the Commission is hereby reversed and remanded where it granted a
nonpublic utility company the authority to construct and manage an electrical transmission line project under the Act's expedited review process without the requisite
finding that the applicant was a public utility.
That's right, Grain Belt Express no longer has a permit to construct in Illinois.  Grain Belt Express has no approvals in Illinois.  It's back to square one.

And appeals will be fruitless, because the court cited last year's opinion from the Illinois Supreme Court that determined the exact same thing.  Clean Line is not a public utility and therefore the Illinois Commerce Commission cannot grant it a certificate of public convenience and necessity.  Done deal.

Does Clean Line have legal options?  Sure.  But those options will be very, very expensive and very, very time consuming.  Only an idiot would commit to spending millions and trying to fight this battle for several more years, when its also engaged in a similar battle in Missouri.  At what point will Clean Line run out of money?  And will its investors give it more cash to waste pretending there's still a chance for these projects?  My opinion is no.  No, this is the last hurdle GBE just can't jump.

This turn of events is completely unsurprising.  I've been remarking for months that Illinois was about to snatch away GBE's permit.  There was absolutely no chance that the court would decide otherwise after the Illinois Supreme Court decision.  The die was cast.  It's another case of permit whack-a-mole.

So, what did the 5th District opinion say?
Pursuant to section 8-406.1, the section utilized by GBX in the instant case, "[a]
public utility may apply for a certificate of public convenience and necessity pursuant to
this Section for the construction of any new high voltage electric service line and related
facilities (Project)."

Section 3-105 of the Act defines a "public utility" as follows:
"[E]very corporation, company, limited liability company, association, joint stock company or association, firm, partnership or individual, their lessees, trustees, or receivers appointed by any court whatsoever that owns, controls, operates or manages, within this State, directly or indirectly, for public use, any plant,
equipment or property used or to be used for or in connection with, or owns or controls any franchise, license, permit or right to engage in ***

We note, however, that the definition of "public utility" was recently clarified by the Illinois Supreme Court in Illinois Landowners Alliance, NFP v. Illinois Commerce Comm'n, 2017 IL 121302. In Illinois Landowners Alliance, NFP, our supreme court determined that when the Commission grants a company a certificate of public convenience and necessity under section 8-406 of the Act, the "central question remains: Does it even qualify as a public utility under Illinois law so as to be eligible for such a certificate under section 8-406 of the Public Utilities Act?"

Our supreme court determined that Rock Island, a new entrant, was required to present ownership of utility infrastructure assets to qualify as a public utility, as defined in section 3-105, in order to obtain a certificate of public convenience and necessity under section 8-406 of the Act. Id. ¶ 48. In order to qualify as a public utility, our supreme court concluded that "the company must also own, control, operate , or manage, within this State, directly or indirectly, a plant, equipment, or property used or to be used for or in connection with (or must own or control any franchise, license, permit, or right to engage in) the production, transmission, sale, etc. of one of the specified commodities or services." Id. ¶ 39. The supreme court noted that the statute is phrased in the present tense because it requires that a company must own, control, operate, or manage, within the state, a plant, equipment, property, franchise, etc. at the time it seeks certification by the Commission.

The supreme court reasoned that when the General Assembly repealed the prior language in section 3-105 of the Act, which defined a public utility as "every corporation *** that now or hereafter *** may own, control, operate or manage" specific plants, equipment, or property (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1965, ch. 1112/3, ¶ 10.3), it intended, as the court
must presume, to speak only to ownership in the present tense when it eliminated the words "that now or hereafter *** may." Id. ¶ 42. As a result, the court determined that courts must read the statute as "evincing an intention by the legislature to limit the definition of 'public utility' to situations where the subject entity meets the ownership test
at the present time."

Here, GBX similarly fails to establish that it was a public utility at the time it filed its application with the Commission. It is undisputed that GBX does not presently, or at
the time it filed its disputed application with the Commission, own, control, manage, or operate any plant, equipment, or property in Illinois used or to be used for or in connection with the production, transmission, sale, etc. of one of the specified commodities or services. Accordingly, GBX did not meet the definition of a "public utility" under section 3-105 of the Act at the time it filed its application with the
Commission.

...we are not persuaded that the legislature intended for the expedited review process to be an available avenue for nonpublic utility entities. The Commission's conclusion that any nonpublic utility may apply to be a public utility under section 8-406.1 ignores the express language set out in section 8-406.1(a). Significantly, section 8-406.1 of the Act clearly and unambiguously reads that "[a] public utility may apply for a certificate of public convenience and necessity pursuant to this Section ***."  As such, our interpretation of section 8-406.1 requires that the applicant must meet the definition of a public utility. In order to obtain status as a public utility, the applicant must meet the ownership test at the time of application, the same prerequisite in section 8-406, and the Commission must make this finding before issuance of a certificate. Here, GBX holds an option to purchase property that would serve as the site to place equipment for the proposed project. "[H]aving an option to buy something is not the same as owning or even controlling it," and an option agreement "does not involve the transfer or [sic] property or an interest therein." Illinois Landowners Alliance, NFP
The court says that Section 8.406.1, the "expedited process" under which GBE applied for its permit is specifically reserved for existing public utilities.  GBE is not a public utility because it doesn't own or control any utility property in Illinois.  It uses the Supreme Court's opinion in Illinois Landowners (RICL decision) as the basis for its finding.  The only place for Clean Line to appeal this is at the Illinois Supreme Court.  That's a dead end.  The Supreme Court is unlikely to reconsider the same argument and come to a different conclusion.

But don't despair, Clean Line, there's still a "way forward" for GBE... you don't need a permit from Illinois to build your project at all!  The only thing is, without a permit and a public utility designation from the ICC, you won't have eminent domain authority.  I mean, you have always said you weren't seeking eminent domain for your projects, right, Clean Line?  Go ahead, try to obtain needed rights of way across Illinois without the coercion of eminent domain.  Landowners love you, right?  That's what the court has instructed you to do:
The supreme court noted, however, that the Act does not prohibit new entrants from commencing development as a purely private project before applying to become a public utility in Illinois:
"Once their projects are further underway and they have obtained the ownership, management, or control of utility-related property or equipment required to qualify as public utilities, they may then seek certification to operate as public utilities if they wish to conduct their business in a way that would make them subject to the Public Utilities Act's regulatory framework."

As a result, the Commission must find that an entity is a public utility at the time of application in order to utilize the expedited review process in section 8-406.1 of the Act.
Unable to meet the requisite ownership test, GBX is not a public utility under section 3-105 of the Act, but rather an entity with a purely private project that does not require the
Commission's authority to proceed.
The media says, "Clean Line officials couldn't be reached yesterday."

Maybe Michael Skelly simply couldn't reach the telephone?

1 Comment

Federal Transmission Permitting Is a Bad Idea

3/7/2018

1 Comment

 
This guy.  Ugh.
The Republican Party’s current infrastructure spending bill is missing one item: a provision establishing federal siting authority for electric transmission lines. Oddly, this idea has few champions in Congress and only tepid support from environmental groups.
That's because its an awful idea that nobody supports.  Congress doesn't support it.  And do you know why that is?  Because states and citizens oppose it.

While natural gas is limited by its geographic sourcing, electricity generation can take place anywhere.  The days of coal mine mouth electric generation plants and long distance transmission lines are over.  It's much more efficient to move fuel to generation plants located closer to load.  And it's much easier to move fuel than it is to build electric transmission lines.

We don't need federal authority for transmission lines.
Problematically, the best locations for wind and solar power plants are far from population centers—in the windy central plains or the sunny southwestern deserts.
That's absolutely not true.  The "best locations" for wind plants are offshore, conveniently located within just a few miles of the largest population centers.  The "best locations" for solar are right on your own roof, where source and sink align to create the most reliable system.
More than ever, consumers want green power.
Also not true.  When consumers were given an opportunity to purchase renewable energy transmission capacity from the Midwest, there were no takers.  Whether it was a matter of price (new transmission will produce a cost to consumers in the billions of dollars), or a matter of favoring local resources, or both, consumers rejected Clean Line Energy Partner's plans for new transmission.  Consumers who say they want "clean" energy in a random survey are never given complete information about how much this "clean" energy is going to cost, and when the rubber hits the road, consumers vote with their wallets.  Any consumer truly dedicated to a "need" for clean power can make it happen at home.  We don't need big utilities and expensive new infrastructure to make it happen.
Conservatives claim that federal transmission siting authority would threaten state sovereignty or landowner property rights, but those claims ring hollow. Why are those values worth protecting against transmission lines but not against natural gas pipelines?
Those claims don't ring hollow to the affected landowners, and those are the only parties who matter in this instance.  Landowners, frankly, don't give a shit if some policy wonk in the big city thinks their legislators' protection of private property rights sounds hypocritical.  Those policy wonks won't be voting in the next local election, but the landowners will.

Why is it that these liberal wind bags demand that you abandon your own beliefs if you don't support theirs?  "Okay, so you're against transmission lines, therefore you must also be concerned about my issue."  No, we're not.  Attempts to reframe the argument to paint opposition as hypocritical serve no one and are just a waste of time.  But while we're on the subject of hypocritical arguments, that's where your environmental groups come in.  They attempt to use landowners to serve their environmental goals by latching onto non-environmental arguments, such as eminent domain.  And then they get caught supporting eminent domain for electric transmission lines, but not for gas lines.  And then the people start to feel used.

Dude, your argument is crap.  Federal permitting and siting for electric transmission has been attempted many times over the years and it has consistently failed.  Elected officials know it can't happen.  That's why they don't support it.

Duh.

Never going to happen.
1 Comment

Transource "Respects" Landowners by Filing for Court Order to Trespass and Damage Property

3/1/2018

3 Comments

 
Transource Urges Court to Deny Due Process for Landowners
Transource has sunk to new lows this week.  Hard to believe they could go any lower, right?

Transource filed petitions in Pennsylvania and Maryland courts asking the court to order landowners along its proposed route to permit entry for "surveying," including "geotechnical surveys (including soundings and drillings for testing soil and bedrock)," and "civil surveys (including trimming or cutting vegetation necessary for survey purposes)."  That's right, in addition to all the other things it wants to do to private property, Transource wants to clear cut your trees and bring large equipment across your place so that it may drill into your bedrock.  And guess what you're going to get for this intrusion?  A promise that Transource will give you money to repair the damage they do.  You believe them, don't you?

I couldn't think of a more certain way to demonstrate to landowners how little they matter and how much this company disrespects them than this statement in a court filing:
Defendants will suffer no damage as a consequence of granting immediate possession, because any damage to the land will be remedied by the payment of money, per the statute.
Money can't put 100 year old trees back where Grandpa planted them.  And it probably can't fix compacted and mixed soil, not really.  And if your horse steps into a random drill hole and breaks a leg, maybe you can buy a new one with your free Transource horse voucher.  It's just a possession, right?  It's almost as useful as getting a free $10 meal voucher for having to spend 11 hours at an airport waiting for a cancelled flight to be rescheduled.
So what's the problem here?  The problem is that Transource has no legal authority to enter private property to "survey," and landowners have refused to voluntarily give permission to enter.  Transource is in a big, giant hurry to get its project built.  In fact, they're in such a hurry that they can't seem to wait for the state public utility commissions to find their project necessary and they want to pretty much "move forward" on building their project ahead of state approval.

​Transource spokespuppet Abby Foster tried to pretend it's just a few landowners holding up progress:
Transource appreciates that many landowners have granted them access to conduct surveys, Foster said. 
​
"Transource and its representatives are committed to treating landowners and their properties with respect," Foster said. "While reaching a voluntary agreement with property owners is a high priority, it is imperative for Transource to continue through the phases of the project as the company seeks regulatory approvals. The approval of this filing will allow Transource to proceed with field work for those landowners who have not yet granted the company access.”
How many landowners have granted them access on the proposed Eastern right of way?  Well, Transource's application says there are 38 owners in York County.  The media says filings were made against 36 landowners.  Two out of 38 is "many?"  No, it's not.  If it was only a few landowners, Transource could go around them and wouldn't need to file these desperate, reaching petitions.

It is not "imperative" for Transource to continue through the phases of its project before it has been determined needed by the state utility commissions.  Just because Transource and PJM signed an agreement setting pretty impossible deadlines is not reason enough to trespass upon private property, damage it, and then take away any due process for landowners to object.

​Transource says:
Transource PA will not be able to begin construction in time to allow the Project to be completed to meet the in-service date set by PJM.  If Transource PA misses the PJM-mandated in-service date, the public will suffer irreparable harm in the form of continued electric gridlock, and delay or ultimate failure  of the project.  Furthermore, Transource P A will suffer irreparable harm as Transource Energy has invested considerable time and money in attempting to obtain access rights to the route.

In fact, Transource PA has invested more than $6.0 million to date in siting, design and engineering. The foregoing harms would also result if Transource PA's access is obstructed by Landowners, or other unauthorized and untrained third parties who are present on the Property in the vicinity of the work corridor at the invitation of Landowners
Suffer?  The public will suffer?  How about those landowners whose property you've commandeered?  I mean, it sure sounds like you want to take over the place and make sure no "untrained parties" are allowed to use their properties while you are surveying.  Hey, guess what?  I read Transource's attachment on how to survey for bog turtles.  Complete instructions included.  Maybe landowners can do their own surveys?  Seems simple enough.  Either you see one or you don't.  And, by the way, can you define "electric gridlock" and list the actual harms that will be experienced by the public because of it?  You make it sound like people are going to drop dead if you're not allowed to trespass on private property.

And as far as your whining about how much money you've "invested?"  You act like this is your own money, Transource, and if you don't complete the project you'll lose your "investment."  That's absolutely not true!  Transource is guaranteed to recover its prudent "investment" in the project, plus 10.4% interest, even if the project is cancelled.  If the project is delayed and/or cancelled, Transource won't be harmed at all.  Transource will be made whole (plus 10.4% for its trouble) by electric ratepayers across the PJM region.  No harm to Transource.

But you know what's most galling of all?  Transource's attempt to prevent due process for affected landowners in Maryland.
Accordingly, this Court may issue an Order, granting this petition and authorizing Transource MD to enter onto the Subject Property to conduct surveys, and obtain information in connection with the acquisition and project, without the need for a hearing prior to the issuance of the Order.
Not only is Transource's legal pondering in its petitions unsound, but they want a judge to wave his magic wand and grant them the right to trespass without the landowner being able to question the company's facts and legal conclusions.  Only a lawyer who knows his work is shockingly wrong would insist that no other parties be allowed to participate and expose him for the corporate shyster that he is.

This just can't happen.

This is a train wreck waiting to happen.  You can't bully your way onto private property with the intention of destroying it just because you *want* to build something on it, maybe, later on, if you get actual permission.  Seems to me that cutting vegetation and drilling ARE construction.  Construction without a permit.

Tick tock, Transource!
3 Comments

"Clean Line Builds..."

2/18/2018

2 Comments

 
...the answer is NOT "transmission lines for wind and solar projects."  I'll spare you the lecture about verb tenses (but you can get it here) but basically there are three verb tenses -- past, present and future.  Clean Line has not built anything, therefore to say it "builds" is incorrect.  Clean Line is not currently "building" a transmission line.  Clean Line has not "built" a transmission line in the past.  Clean Line perhaps hopes it "will build" a transmission line in the future, but I don't think that's likely.  The only thing Clean Line seems to be building anymore is Michael Skelly's ego.

What purpose did the Houston Chronicle article serve?  Was the reporter actually trying to make a point?  That renewable energy isn't "lonely" in Houston?  Michael Skelly may be about as lonely as they come these days.  Nobody seems to care about the transmission lines he hopes to build anymore.  It's all about Michael Skelly, just like it was all about Michael Skelly back in August, when Skelly practiced heroics with his feet on a table during Hurricane Harvey.  And back in 2014, when he showcased his heroism in building a compound of historic homes in one of those terrible "poorer" neighborhoods.  Building -- something that was actually done.  Not something one aspires to in order to pretend it's happening.  Michael Skelly sure has "built" quite the ego.

Skelly likes to pretend that the abandonment of his dream and the sale of a portion of his project to NextEra was a "success."

Michael Skelly, the company's president, told Arkansas Business that the direct-current project, which would have transmitted 4,000 megawatts of renewable energy from Western Oklahoma to eastern Tennessee, is basically on life support.

"Everybody knows that if you can delay a project, you can hurt it or force a different outcome," Skelly said after devoting nearly nine years and some $100 million in private investor money to the project, which would have crossed 12 Arkansas counties with 200-foot-high transmission towers. "We're ending up with an outcome that's just fine for us business-wise, but not as good for Arkansas."
Actually, Arkansas will be just fine without a "clean" line.  The project was never purposed to benefit Arkansans anyhow.  It was about Michael Skelly and his investors making a bundle of money riding the renewable energy wave to sell a bunch of clueless people something they didn't want or need.  Except it turns out they really didn't want or need it, and the project went broke.  Clean Line gladly cannibalized its Plains & Eastern project and sold the juiciest cut to NextEra.  What's left isn't even good for soup.  Not only doesn't Clean Line's Arkansas and Tennessee assets not connect with anything, but the company withdrew their interconnection requests.  There's nothing to interconnect.  Clean Line is over.

As far as that delay thing goes, he's partly right though.  It may have turned out oh so differently for Michael Skelly and Clean Line if they had honestly attempted to engage landowners along the route and find out what would inspire them to sign a voluntary right of way agreement.  Instead, Clean Line acted like an arrogant, entitled, smart ass, figuring it only had to make it look like it was negotiating with landowners, while desperately attempting to acquire the power of eminent domain to force involuntary easements.  Any cost conscious, astute developer would have given up many years ago, however.  Only Michael Skelly continued for 9 years, wasting increasing amounts of funds supplied by his silly investors.  Business-wise, Clean Line is a bust.  I'm thinking they didn't get anywhere near the $100M they spent on Plains & Eastern in the NextEra sale.  Only Skelly's ego is pretending that was a good outcome.  Maybe if he says it enough, money to repay the investors will fall from the sky?  Maybe if he says it enough, he won't be a 50-something year old failure?
So Skelly is pretending he and his company are still viable in order to maintain the old ego.  But what's wrong with Vicki Ayres-Portman?  Did someone forget to send her the memo about Clean Line's sale of its Oklahoma assets, or is she quite insane?  I received numerous copies of this article last week.  It says:
Clean Line Energy spokeswoman Vicki Ayres-Portman explained the impact wind energy has had on local county budgets and what it would mean to be the member of a state that divests in wind energy at Monday's get-together.
Ayres-Portman was taking the place of originally scheduled speaker Mark Yates, Oklahoma director for the Wind Coalition.
“Most of you have probably heard there are two bills running on the floor of the house today that would have a detrimental impact on the future and possibly retroactive on wind development,” she said. “So Mark felt like he really needed to stay at the capitol today and asked if I would stop by on my way to the capitol and give you guys an update on wind energy in Oklahoma.”

What interest does Clean Line have in Oklahoma wind at this point?  Or are they simply a registered lobbying agent for NextEra?  And why was Vicki on her way to the capitol?  Clean Line sold its Oklahoma assets, remember?
Ayres-Portman detailed the well publicized and still working 9-year-old Clean Line project set to run from the Oklahoma Panhandle to Tennessee. The $2.5 billion, 4,000 megawatt project that was set to provide energy to customers in Arkansas, Tennessee and other markets stalled recently. The issues hamstringing the plans come after President Trump began pushing coal and nuclear power options.
"The market has really changed since Clean Line started this effort eight, nine years ago,” Ayres-Portman said. “At that time, the bioenergy centers to the East were really looking forward to more renewables. We had a new President elected. And although I agree with a lot of great things he’s done, one of the things, pushing coal and nuclear has really dampened the power purchase agreements from big utilities that were looking at doing renewables, whether that was natural gas, wind or solar.”
So those companies that had memorandums of understanding to come onto the Clean Line transmission line, have pulled away from those agreement.
Still working?  What the hell does that mean?  How can Clean Line be "still working" in Oklahoma when it doesn't own anything in Oklahoma?  The demise of Clean Line is Trump's fault?  Anything but!  The demise of Clean Line is Clean Line's fault.  It failed to attract any customers. No customers, no revenue, no "builds."  What "companies" had memorandums of understanding to "come onto the Clean Line?"  No company had such an understanding, so there's nothing to "pull away" from.  Clean Line acts like it has some firm commitments that were cancelled after Trump was elected.  That's just not true.  Ayres-Portman looks like she's quite insane in that article.  Maybe she'd like to make some corrections so she doesn't "build" herself a reputation as a fabulist?

Clean Line needs to just go away.  The idea that consumers would pay a premium to import wind energy from far, far away wasn't viable.  And the idea that landowners would welcome a transmission line across their property if it carried "renewable energy" was completely bogus.  Enough time and money has been wasted.  Give the old ego a rest and just go away.  I think you might be on the verge of embarrassing yourself.
2 Comments

Shame On You, Transource!

1/13/2018

4 Comments

 
Transource is a new joint venture of utility giant American Electric Power and Great Plains Energy.  So far, it seems that Transource's Independence Energy Connection is being managed by AEP employees.  AEP has more than 100 years of experience building utility infrastructure and interacting with consumers.  So how did they screw this up so badly?  Why has an elected representative demanded that Transource cease and desist aggressive and illegal land acquisition practices and issue an apology to all the landowners it threatened?

You've gone too far, Transource.  Shame on you!

Transource thinks that perhaps they're dealing with a bunch of rubes who are easily threatened into submission.  After all, the eastern portion of the project is only 10 miles of line in a rural community bisected by a state border... but it's a sophisticated and well connected community.  Transource, your strong arm tactics and lies don't work here!

During the past week, Transource poured the gas on their fruitless efforts to get landowners to sign legal documents giving the company permission to "survey."  Landowners are never required to sign survey permission forms.  While Pennsylvania law allows a public utility to access private property, there's a lot more to it that Transource presumes landowners don't know.
Furthermore, the Transource letter sent to landowners  dated January 5, 2018 is inaccurate  and misrepresentative of the proper procedures set in place  under the Eminent  Domain  Code and public  codes of the Commonwealth. In  the letter, your company  stated it  has obtained utility status by Pennsylvania. While the Public Utility Commission (PUC) approved Transource's application for utility  status on December 21, 2017, your company  has yet to obtain  the appropriate certificate  and orders from  the PUC to  operate as a public utility  and conduct land surveys/assessments. Moreover,  even after obtaining the appropriate approvals,  Transource must follow the Eminent Domain Code  and issue a  10-day notice to all landowners before  accessing private property. As of today, Transource cannot  send such a notice until the proper certificate and approvals from the PUC.
And Transource is going to pretend, with all its lawyers and legal support staff, that it didn't know these things?  I don't believe you!  And even if Transource was completely unaware of Pennsylvania law, there's absolutely no excuse for threatening to have landowners arrested on their own property.  You went too far, Transource.

Even if Transource has the legal right to enter onto property, a landowner never has to sign a permission form.  If the company exercises its right to access property without the owner's permission it cannot expect that the landowner would release the company from liability for its use of the property.  You need never sign a permission to access form.

Numerous landowners on the eastern portion of the project reported a rash of strong arm tactics by Transource land agent Western Land Services last week.  Landowners received threatening phone calls demanding that they sign the survey permission form or the sheriff would come and arrest them.
I have received numerous complaints from constituents in my legislative district who experienced threatening behavior from your contracted land  services agent, Western Land Services. In communication with landowners,  agents from Westem Land  Services threatened to call the sheriff's office  and arrest residents who did not  sign letters granting access to their properties. This type of coercive behavior and  harassment by your contracted  agent is unacceptable  and illegal  at best. I  am requesting punitive actions be  taken to  ensure this type of disrespectful behavior  does not  happen again during  the remainder of  the project.
The sheriff isn't going to arrest these landowners for failing to sign a permission form.  At best, if Transource receives all its permits from the PUC the most it can do is issue a notification that it will be access the property in 10 days.  Such notice would need proof of delivery.  Only if Transource had accomplished all the necessary legal steps and had some sort of legal order to present to the sheriff, and the landowner physically threatened or interfered with property access, would the sheriff even be interested in wasting his time on this issue.  Your sheriff works for you, not some company in Columbus, Ohio.

Whose idea was this, and why did they think it would work to intimidate this community?  That person needs to be fired, first for breaking the law, second for having no morals, and third for being stupid, I mean just a complete idiot.

It really wasn't that long ago that another company got in big, big trouble in the Pennsylvania court and regulatory system by deploying threatening and coercive land acquisition tactics just like these.  And TrAILCo's application to build transmission in Pennsylvania was denied by the administrative law judge who heard he case.  Did TrAILCo's abysmal behavior play a part in its ultimate denial?  Absolutely!  Let's look at all the abusive land acquisition tactics that Transource has in common with TrAILCo... so far.
All communications with property owners and occupants must be factually correct and made in good faith.

Do not make false or misleading statements.

Do not misrepresent any fact.

Until the Company has been authorized by the state utility commission, do not suggest that the Project is a "done deal" or is "99 percent sure" or make similar statements suggesting that the state utility commission has authorized construction of the project.

All Communications and interactions with property owners and occupants of property must be respectful and reflect fair dealing.

Do not engage in behavior that may be considered harassing, coercive, manipulative, intimidating or causing undue pressure. 

All communications by a property owner, whether in person, by telephone or in writing, in which the property owner indicates that he or she does not want to negotiate or does not want to give permission for surveying or other work on his or her property, must be respected and politely accepted without argument.

Do not represent that a relative, neighbor and/or friend have signed a document or reached an agreement with the company.

Do not represent that a relative, neighbor and/or friend supports or opposes the Project.

Do not threaten to call law enforcement officers or obtain court orders.

Do not threaten the use of eminent domain.
We've hardly just begun, Transource, and already you've violated accepted conduct for land agents working on your behalf.  I know you're going to blame Western Land Services for going rogue behind your back, or a few "bad" agents who don't understand their job.  But I know that's just not true.  Land acquisition companies behave badly with the full knowledge of the company who is paying them.  So maybe it's time to fire this company.  And Transource needs to get all the money it paid Western refunded to the ratepayers so it won't cost the ratepayers anything extra to hire a reputable company with some moral and ethical standards.

Does PJM Interconnection know how badly you've screwed up this transmission project they "ordered" you to build?  If I was PJM, I'd cancel your contract and find a reputable company to build it instead.

Meanwhile, Representative Hill wants you to apologize to the landowners you harassed.  Try to be a big boy and take responsibility for your actions and don't blame them on rogue land agents or a fly-by-night company.  You all know what's going on and chose to try to strong arm this community willingly.  It blew up in your face.  

​Shame on you!
4 Comments

Plains & Eastern Clean Line Killed

1/1/2018

16 Comments

 
...but the bullshit never stops!

Hi Gullible One-Sided Story Journalist,  Attached is some bullshit that you can use for your story.  We have also provided someone else to blame for Michael Skelly's failure.  If you need anything else to craft your biased, fantasy story, please let me know!

The Tennessee Valley Authority is getting blamed for "killing" the Plains & Eastern Clean Line.

The Plains & Eastern Clean Line is dead?  Sweet!
Time to celebrate, Mayberry Munchkins!  Do you really care who gets blamed for "killing" it?  In my opinion, the TVA is a hero who refused to bow to greenwashing political pressure and in so doing saved its customers from higher rates and landowners outside its service territory from financial and economic harm for benefit of super-rich foreign investors.

Bravo, TVA!  Well done!

Except it really wasn't TVA's fault.  It's Michael Skelly's fault.  Clean Line had no customers.  No customers, no revenue, no financing, no construction, no transmission line.  It's just that simple.  Skelly might as well blame Duke Energy, Southern Co., Entergy, Florida Power & Light, or any other utility, for not buying his transmission capacity.  Skelly was proposing a merchant project where all risk is shouldered by investors, not consumers.  Skelly was granted negotiated rate authority by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to negotiate rates for his transmission service with willing customers.  Nothing in Skelly's transmission plan obligated the TVA, or any other utility, to become customers.  If Frito-Lay goes out of business next week, will it be YOUR fault for keeping your New Year's resolution to lay off the over-processed, salty, junk food?  Of course not!  You choose what to buy and who to buy it from.  The same is true of merchant transmission projects like Clean Line.  The whining of the "environmentalists" makes me laugh!  Once again, the environmentalists completely fail at trying to plan and run the TVA from their home offices.  These "environmentalists" have no idea what it takes to run the TVA so they need to shut their pie holes and let the professionals do their jobs.

So, how dead is Plains & Eastern?
The nation's biggest wind generator, NextEra Energy Resources, has bought the Oklahoma portion of the proposed 700-mile-long Plains and Eastern Line to serve Oklahoma and Midwest customers. But for now, plans to bring wind energy from the windy areas of Oklahoma and Texas into the less-windy Tennessee Valley and Southeastern part of the United States are stalled and unlikely to be resurrected for years.

"Unfortunately, this represents a significant delay in our ability to deliver this energy in the Southeast," Skelly said of the decision not to actively pursue the project at this time. "TVA's lack of interest has certainly not been helpful."

Skelly said other utilities want to buy wind-generated power, and Clean Line is now focusing on its four other transmission projects in the Midwest and the Western part of the United States. NextEra will use the Oklahoma part of the Plains and Eastern line to begin serving parts of Oklahoma, Kansas with wind-generated power that NextEra plans to develop.

"We are hanging onto our permits and rights of way in Arkansas in the event TVA in the future says it might like this power somewhere down the line, " Skelly said. "But at this point it would take considerably more effort to get this project moving for TVA again."


"TVA obviously has to make its own decisions about its future power supply, and we understand that," Skelly said. "But for now, we've stopped the process [of pursuing an interconnection agreement with TVA] because TVA required a whole lot of money to continue in this process but they have not wanted to make any commitments to buy the energy off of this line."
Oh, puh-leeze, Michael Skelly.  Do you actually believe your own lies?  TVA required a whole lot of money to continue the interconnection process because continuing to study your project for interconnection (which is completely separated from the study of whether or not to buy capacity on the line) costs the TVA money!  The TVA isn't paying dividends to investors with all the money it was charging Clean Line to remain in the interconnection queue.  Where do you think the TVA gets its money, Michael Skelly?  It gets all its money from its customers -- regular people who pay an electric bill.  Why should those people pay extra for TVA staff to continue to study the Plains & Eastern Clean Line to determine whether it may interconnect to the TVA transmission system without causing reliability problems?  Does Skelly think that he should get a free ride on the backs of hard-working Mayberrians?

So, if TVA's "whole lot of money" was too rich for Clean Line's bank account, where is Skelly going to get the money to "hang onto our permits and rights of way in Arkansas"?  That costs money, too, and for an undetermined "maybe" period of time?  I don't think so.

Skelly tries really hard to pretend that the part of his project that he didn't sell to another company is still commercially viable.
But Skelly said other utilities have found that their projections about the costs of using a variable source of power like wind have often proven more than expected "and as battery and other storage methods become better, wind will prove even more attractive."

"We think we gave TVA a very good offer, but apparently they did not," he said. "We're still getting a lot of interest from other utilities that want to increase their renewable energy and see wind as a good way to achieve that at a reasonable cost."

Skelly said Duke Power and other Southeastern utilities have expressed interest in buying more wind-generated power, but TVA was needed to buy and/or readily transmit the 3,500 megawatts the line was designed to deliver to Memphis.

Well, goll-lee, Mr. Skelly, if these other utilities want to buy your transmission capacity then you don't need TVA at all, right?  Why would you need TVA to buy something that another company wants to buy?  If you have customers, then go ahead and build your project.

Instead, Plains & Eastern is dead.  It's dead because it failed to attract any paying customers.  It failed to attract any paying customers because it was a bad idea that failed.
Skelly said he and his partners have been working on the Clean Line transmission project for more than eight years and have had to battle local landowners who didn't want to sell their land and regulators in Arkansas who balked at permitting the transmission line rights of way to a developer from another state.
"We've been able to overcome those obstacles, but we always knew when we started it wouldn't necessarily be easy or quick," he said. "But we do think it is the right choice in the long run."

The right choice?  Eight years of misery and more than $200M dumped into a bad idea?  Maybe it was only "the right choice" because that $200M and the land along the right of way belonged to other people and not Michael Skelly.

I think Michael Skelly should stop trying to blame everyone else for his own failure.

But there's this:  The Plains & Eastern Clean Line is dead, according to the Chattanooga Times Free Press! 
16 Comments

Clean Line's Big Top Begins to Fall

12/26/2017

9 Comments

 
Look out below, everyone!  The Clean Line circus tent is beginning to collapse.  Any clowns remaining in the ring are in grave danger!  Abandon circus, abandon circus!
Picture
In the center ring, the Plains & Eastern Clean Line has been butchered and the tastiest cuts have been sold to NextEra Energy for an undisclosed sum.  It remains to be seen what NextEra will cook up with the piece it has purchased or whether there actually is a market for a huge amount of wind energy in eastern Oklahoma.  A NextEra spokesman commented, "...we have more work to do commercially before construction begins...".  Right.  Just like Clean Line, there are no customers.  I hope NextEra's Big Top is a little sturdier (and its pockets a bit deeper) than Clean Line's.

So, Clean Line wants to pretend that because NextEra only bought the Oklahoma portion of the project that the remainder still held by Clean Line will someday become valuable.  That crap isn't even fit for sausage.  There is no value because there are no customers who want to buy at the TVA interconnection.  In fact, it looks like Clean Line's TVA interconnection queue position has been withdrawn.  That means Clean Line no longer wants to inject energy into the TVA region.  Over.  Done.  Maybe NextEra has enough cash to speculate on the Oklahoma portion someday being viable, but even they don't think the portion from the Oklahoma border to Memphis is worth the risk.

And over in the ring to my left, the Rock Island Clean Line has fallen off the trapeze and broken every bone in its body.  The clowns have been pantomiming continuing life support, but the audience knows it's a goner.

Over in the last ring, the Grain Belt Express lies gasping while the clowns are bringing in a string of potential buyers for pieces of its carcass in their cute, little cars.  How many transmission executives can you fit into a garishly-painted VW beetle?  And what portion of GBE does anyone think is viable?

Clean Line Energy's circus is all but over.

9 Comments

Clean Line Begs Utility Giant AEP to Open an Escape Hatch

12/13/2017

7 Comments

 
UPDATE!
Is AEP just being taken for a ride in Oklahoma?
Will AEP end up stabbed in the back and dumped in a ditch?
Click here

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Things seem to be winding down at Clean Line Energy Partners over the last month or so.  The rats continue to abandon the mothership.  Take a look at Clean Line's "Leadership" page and notice that a couple former executives are now missing.  It looks to me like maybe the transmission folks are leaving, with only the wind energy people still on investor Bluescape's leash.  I wonder if Bluescape is trying to salvage something out of its investment in Clean Line by jettisoning the loser transmission projects and focusing on more wind farms like Mesa Canyons?

The Rock Island Clean Line is dead.  It can't use eminent domain in Iowa or Illinois.

The Grain Belt Express is on life support.  Despite Clean Line's desperate attempt to get the Missouri Supreme Court to hear its case, there has been no response and the case has been scheduled to be heard in the Appeals Court next year.  And, on the off chance that GBE succeeds on appeal, the Illinois courts must kill it because the Illinois Supreme Court already ruled in the RICL case that Clean Line isn't a public utility.  Checkmate.

The Plains & Eastern Clean Line is a zombie.  Despite the "participation" of the U.S. Department of Energy in that project, customers have stubbornly failed to materialize.  It's been nearly two years since the DOE issued its "Record of Decision" that Clean Line thinks gives its project the okay to build.  And still no customers in sight.  According to E&E News:
While not yet ready to begin construction, Hurtado said the next big milestone isn't far off, and Clean Line has turned its focus to finding key customers.

"We've been at it for a while, and we're very close to the finish line," he said.

Clean Line has yet to announce any firm agreements with Southeast utilities for transmission. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking.

"We think that there's a time-sensitive opportunity," Hurtado said. "I'm not comfortable waiting too much longer. The sooner we can get this done, the better. There are always risks, and you want to manage that really prudently. We're already in pre-construction. The sooner we get into full-fledged construction, the better."

"Obviously, the trick is to make sure that you have capacity at the right price to the people that are actually winning the contracts in the Southeast," Hurtado said. "There's direct commercial discussions that are going on that are confidential. There are RFPs [requests for proposals], and that's still moving forward. It's part of our overall commercial discussions that we've got that are sort of focused, but they're all sort of in the works."


One potential customer, the Tennessee Valley Authority, so far hasn't shown an interest in taking transmission service from the Plains and Eastern.

TVA signed a memorandum of understanding with Clean Line in 2011, but the utility currently has no need for more energy on its system as its long-range plans show no demand growth for the next decade, said spokesman Scott Brooks.

And any older power plants being shut down by TVA are generally being replaced with natural-gas-fired generation, Brooks said.
Picture
But wait!  A real utility has proposed a new transmission project across Oklahoma.  American Electric Power wants to buy a ginormous wind farm and build a 765kV alternating current transmission line across the state and distribute the energy to its customers.  And AEP wants ratepayers in four states where it serves customers to pay for its project.  That's right, AEP wants state utility commissions in Oklahoma and other states AEP serves to allocate the cost of their project to ratepayers.  AEP is not building a merchant transmission project, where the  utility finances the project construction and then negotiates rates with voluntary customers.  AEP will only build its project if its cost will be covered by ratepayers, along with a hefty return on equity to AEP.

A look at the Oklahoma Commerce Commission's docket (Case No. 201700267) for AEP's filing doesn't look promising.  It seems most of the parties are against it, either because they don't want to shoulder the cost, or because there was no competition in selecting the wind generator.  And AEP is trying to rush this through with only a cursory examination because it must latch onto the government teat known as the Production Tax Credit before it expires in order to bring "savings" to ratepayers.  If this project only provides "savings" from tax subsidies, then it's just not worth doing.  But AEP stands to make a bundle on its investment in a new wind farm and transmission line.  Whoever owns the assets makes the profits.

And wouldn't you know it, Clean Line intervened in AEP's project docket to support this "laudable" project.  But only if AEP uses Plains & Eastern instead of building its own transmission line.  Or maybe AEP can partner with Clean Line?  Or invest in Clean Line?  Or AEP can completely redesign the project and change its route?  Or perhaps buy the Plains & Eastern Clean Line?  Or perhaps scrape Clean Line off the underside of a park bench with a putty knife, chew it up, and spit it out?  It seems that Mario Hurtado is pretty much open to anything that would monetize his fruitless efforts to build the Plains & Eastern Clean Line for the past eight years.  Sounds like Plains & Eastern is begging AEP to open an escape hatch so they can get this cash cow off the books.
Plains and Eastern is open to PSO or other utilities customers owning all or a portion of the transmission line, commensurate with their transmission needs. In addition, Plains and Eastern is open to PSO or other utilities managing part or all of the Plains & Eastern Project's construction.

If there is a demand for Oklahoma Panhandle wind in eastern Oklahoma, the Project's first phase could be built solely in Oklahoma. Subsequent phases could be built at a later date if market demands warranted such action.

While Plains and Eastern's efforts have been focused on HVDC transmission, other technical
solutions could be constructed in the Project's right-of-way, such as 345kV AC or 765kV AC. Plains and Eastern is open to modifying the
Project to a different technology or voltage level if it offers the best value to customers.

The Project begins near Wind Catcher's generation position in the Panhandle and the route runs within 50 miles of PSO's Tulsa North substation, the proposed interconnection point for the Wind Catcher line.  In eastern Oklahoma, there are also other potential interconnection points in PSO's service territory that are even closer to the Plains & Eastern Project's route than the Tulsa North substation and could be utilized to serve PSO load and other loads.
Clean Line wastes a lot of ink touting its "approved route" and purchased easements for its project as a sure thing that will save AEP time and money.  Except Plains & Eastern's route is nowhere near AEP's proposed route and does not connect with AEP's substations.  Somehow, finding a new route to connect P&E's proposed route with AEP's proposed route gets glossed over.  Why would AEP want to take some circuitous route across the state and build many more miles of transmission than it actually needs?  But like a polished used car salesman, Clean Line tries to sell its route and "relationships" with landowners as a sure thing.  Clean Line seems to take the position that is is somehow superior to AEP in the transmission building game and can do it better.
Furthermore, the Plains and Eastern team has received many questions from landowners and other stakeholders in Oklahoma about the Wind Catcher project. The team has been asked if Plains and Eastern can be involved or assist in the Wind Catcher project given that Plains and Eastern has a construction-ready, long-haul transmission project that runs from the Oklahoma Panhandle to the east and has acquired easements on more than 750 parcels in Oklahoma.
Said no one ever?  Who are these people?  Do they have names?  Why in the world would anyone want a company that has never built anything or realized a dime of revenue to "assist" a public utility that has been around for more than 100 years?
After being approached by representatives of PSO, Oklahoma landowners have asked the Plains and Eastern team if they should work with PSO even though they have already signed an easement with Plains and Eastern.
And what was the "team's" response, Mario, do tell?  Did you say, "Transmission lines are like Lays Potato Chips, you can never have just one?"  Or did you tell the landowners to slam the door in the face of any PSO (AEP) land agent?  Or maybe you told them to try to sell your project to AEP so you'd have enough cash to make the next payment on your easement option contracts?

All of a sudden, Clean Line has changed the focus of its Plains & Eastern project.  It's no longer about bringing wind power to "states farther east."  It's about bringing wind power to eastern Oklahoma now.  Ahhh... desperation, the mother of invention...
The power markets have evolved substantially since Plains and Eastern received its order from this Commission in the past eight years and eastern Oklahoma is now a strong delivery point for the Plains & Eastern Project. The Project could be utilized to accommodate high-voltage either direct current ("HVDC") and alternating current ("AC") transmission solutions to accomplish this interconnection in eastern Oklahoma and Plains and Eastern is willing to engage to consider either option. Mr. Hurtado stated that he would explain that Plains and Eastern is open to building a first
phase of the Project that is located solely in Oklahoma.
And then Mario comes out with this gem.
SPP has no plans to build new transmission
lines in the next decade, making independent transmission necessary to enable large amounts of new wind farms to be built in the Oklahoma Panhandle.
SPP plans and orders built all transmission necessary for reliability and economic reasons within its region.  Oklahoma is in the SPP region.  If SPP doesn't order it built, it's not "necessary."

And then Clean Line says its project is fully approved.
Plains and Eastern has also secured all key regulatory approvals necessary for construction on that route.
Except the "approval" Clean Line has is for a merchant project that must first secure enough customers to finance its construction.  Clean Line does not have "approval" to build a cost allocated line paid for by ratepayers in Oklahoma and other states.  It's like using an apple when your recipe calls for an orange.  As well, Clean Line's "approval" by the U.S. DOE is currently being challenged in federal court and could very likely simply evaporate when the court rules.  And until Clean Line has enough customers to finance its project, it cannot be built.  How long is AEP supposed to wait for Clean Line to find enough customers to build the line?

Clean Line says that DOE's routing of its project "approved" a preferred route.
The DOE independently analyzed the proposed route and several alternative routes in its
EIS and ultimately approved a preferred route through its Record of Decision.
But DOE does not have statutory authority to site a transmission route, therefore it cannot "approve" a preferred route.  Section 1222 of the Energy Policy Act reserves siting for the impacted states.  This point is also part of the ongoing federal lawsuit.

Clean Line says landowners in Oklahoma love them.
Plains and Eastern's careful and open approach to landowner interaction and easement acquisition established the company as a solid partner and good neighbor in Oklahoma
Gosh, that's funny.  The landowners in Oklahoma that I've talked to despise Clean Line and have vowed to NEVER sign a voluntary easement.  Perhaps all Clean Line's Oklahoma friends could be characterized as "low hanging fruit," the easy sells.  Anybody with a checkbook could acquire these easement rights.  It's the difficult ones (according to Mario's testimony more than 40%) that can delay a project for years.  I'm thinking that AEP has never built a transmission project that required eminent domain takings for more than 40% of its route.
Many landowner conversations are on-going, and Plains and Eastern is highly confident that all right-of-way necessary to start construction could be completed in time to allow for construction to start in 2018 and an on-line date in 2020.
Also hard to believe, since Clean Line is depending on the federal government to effect all eminent domain takings for its route, and the U.S. DOJ's attorney absolutely would not commit to the takings during recent oral arguments before a federal judge in Arkansas.

Does Clean Line think AEP has been in business for over 100 years because it's gullible and easily swayed by a fast-talking salesman?  AEP may be a bunch of jerks, but they're not stupid.  AEP knows a Fifty Foot Car when it sees one.

Or is this just the first act in a poorly presented regulatory Kabuki theater where AEP buys up the Plains & Eastern project and systematically cannibalizes it to extract only those land easements that work with its preferred route?  If so, Plains & Eastern is dead.    If AEP wanted to build merchant transmission, it would have proposed its own project as a merchant and wouldn't have any opposition at the Oklahoma Corporation Commission.  Instead, AEP wants to build a captive ratepayer funded transmission project completely within the state of Oklahoma.  Clean Line's expensive dance with the DOE is completely useless, in that case.  But what about Clean Line's agreement to pay the U.S. DOE 2% of its quarterly profits?  Would AEP have to pay DOE 2% of its quarterly profits if it bought Plains & Eastern and used DOE's "approved" route?  I'm sure that will keep a lot of lawyers busy for a long, long time.

AEP says it will respond to Clean Line's filing by the December 22 deadline.  And, hey, Merry Christmas, Clean Line! 
7 Comments

The Dumb Argument Transmission Developers Need to Stop Using Immediately

11/24/2017

4 Comments

 
Transmission developers say a whole bunch of dumb things while trying to convince a public that new transmission is necessary.  These developers will literally say anything, as long as someone tells them it advances their cause.

This really dumb argument has come from the spout of many different transmission developers over the past couple of years, and every time I hear it anew, it just sounds stupider.  What kind of an idiot thought this up and then convinced transmission developers it was a sound argument that would convince the public to rally behind new transmission?  Because I've seen it too many times for it to be an original argument gone viral.  It's not even a good argument. 

Behold!
The electric utility supply of the United States is based on a sharing of facilities and energy sources for both purposes of supply and reliability. There are two transmission corridors whose final sections exist for the benefit of Sudbury, Maynard, and Concord. One begins in Medway and passes through Sherborn, Natick, Framingham, and Wayland. The second, which begins in Waltham, passes through Weston. In effect, the citizens of Medway, Sherborn, Wayland, Weston, Waltham, Framingham, and Natick have had to sacrifice some of their environment for the benefit of Sudbury.

A large group in Sudbury, Protect Sudbury, opposes this line, either overhead or underground, if built along an existing MBTA right-of-way. The group also opposes any overhead line through any route in Sudbury. If only the citizens of Wayland and Weston could have successfully opposed the construction of transmission towers in their towns that supply Sudbury! No tower, no power!
This ad hominem basically goes something like this:  Because your home relies on power from existing transmission lines crossing someone's property somewhere, you owe it to society to have a transmission line on your own property for benefit of someone else.

When do two wrongs make a right?  This argument convinces no one.  Not the transmission opponents who are supposed to somehow feel wrong and guilty about their opposition, and not the general public who already has power and a transmission line in their backyard.  Everyone thinks this is a stupid argument, except maybe transmission developers and Gerald L. Wilson.  I wonder if Mr. Wilson has a transmission line serving others in his backyard?  I wonder if a new one serving others is proposed?  Or is Mr. Wilson just spouting stupid transmission talking points to add some purpose to his happy, golden retirement years?  

As if transmission itself isn't last century's technology, this argument is maybe supposed to take you way back to the electrification of America in the early part of the 20th century.  In order to bring the wonders of electricity to every American, it was necessary to run lines across private property.  Electric utilities were given eminent domain authority because electrifying the country was for the public good.

We've come a long way since then.  Everyone who wants electricity in this country has electricity.  No modern electric transmission line is for the purpose of bringing electricity to people who have none.  Sometimes it's about reliability (but you just can't trust them because they have a tendency to claim a project is needed to keep the lights on when it's more about padding the corporate coffers).  But more often than not new transmission these days is for other reasons that are more want than need.

1.  To make power cheaper somewhere else.
2.  To make power cleaner somewhere else.
3.  To increase annual returns at investor owned utilities.

Eminent domain should never be used for these three reasons.  They're not for the "public good" and only pit one group of citizens against the other to battle over which group's "good" can trounce the other's.  Why does someone have to sacrifice for the "public good" of others?  The 5th Amendment has been used way beyond its initial intent.  How about this?  No one loses, no one has to sacrifice for someone else.

I'm pretty sure if you asked some suburban neighborhood if they would support the destruction of hundreds of family farms so that they may save 2 cents on their monthly electric bill, nobody would go for it.  It's all in how you shape the question.

Telling the suburban neighbors that family farmers are selfish NIMBYs who refuse to do their part to sacrifice for the benefit of others and keep the neighborhood's lights on may garner a different response.

That's what this stupid transmission argument is.  Name calling.  One of the seven common propaganda devices.  It is intended to neutralize debate between groups by demonizing one of them as unacceptable and therefore ending the debate without actually engaging in it.

And it's not even a very good or convincing argument and is easily separated from the reality of today's transmission proposals.  We all have electricity.  Transmission lines to serve us were constructed years ago.  Property with existing transmission lines is less valuable because people associate a negative stigma with transmission lines.  New transmission lines are not necessary to provide electricity to new customers who are suffering without electricity.  Not everyone needs to have a transmission line on their property in order to make sacrifice widespread and "even."  Let's examine the merits of the particular transmission proposal instead of relying on the emotional push of propaganda.  Could the new transmission line be avoided by rebuilding existing transmission lines?  Could the new transmission line be avoided by building new generation closer to load?  Should people make sacrifices for their own energy needs?  Can the new transmission line be altered to be less invasive on land whose owners do not benefit from it?

The first time I heard the "someone sacrificed for you" argument I thought it was dumb.  The second time I heard it, I thought the company using it was completely disconnected from public opinion to think that was a good argument.  The third time I heard it, I started to believe that it had an origin bigger than one company's stupid idea.  Is someone telling transmission developers that this is today's good argument?  It's not.

Stop with the stupid propaganda tricks.  They only work on stupid people.  This argument is ineffective.
4 Comments

Pennsylvania and Maryland Vow to Stop Transource

11/18/2017

0 Comments

 
This video will touch your heart.
For more information and to support these folks, please visit Stop Transource in Pennsylvania and Maryland's website.
0 Comments
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    About the Author

    Keryn Newman blogs here at StopPATH WV about energy issues, transmission policy, misguided regulation, our greedy energy companies and their corporate spin.
    In 2008, AEP & Allegheny Energy's PATH joint venture used their transmission line routing etch-a-sketch to draw a 765kV line across the street from her house. Oooops! And the rest is history.

    About
    StopPATH Blog

    StopPATH Blog began as a forum for information and opinion about the PATH transmission project.  The PATH project was abandoned in 2012, however, this blog was not.

    StopPATH Blog continues to bring you energy policy news and opinion from a consumer's point of view.  If it's sometimes snarky and oftentimes irreverent, just remember that the truth isn't pretty.  People come here because they want the truth, instead of the usual dreadful lies this industry continues to tell itself.  If you keep reading, I'll keep writing.


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