In the Just Desserts category, the City of Aurora, Ohio, says it is pursuing legal action to acquire abandoned railroad right of way that FirstEnergy says it has under contract as the location of a new transmission line through Aurora.
The people of Aurora, and its mayor, have proposed alternatives to the building of the transmission line on an abandoned rail line through the city. FirstEnergy isn't listening. In fact, the company will be holding one of its famous dog and pony shows, "where it will seek public input about the proposed routes and the siting process" next week. Why bother with one of those stilted "open house" displays, FirstEnergy? The city has said "no." It's not going to change its mind. Aurora wants to use the abandoned railway for a recreational path. In addition, there are 500 homes that will be affected by proximity to the proposed project whose owners won't be compensated at all for the drop in their property values.
What happens at a FirstEnergy "open house?" Attendees are greeted and shuffled through a series of "stations" where they can ogle a series of display posters with general information, ending at a table of aerial maps where residents can see how close the project will be to the place they call home. Citizens will be asked to fill out a little card asking which FirstEnergy designed route segments they prefer. The idea is that people will pick the route farthest away from their property, and the route with the least objections "wins." Well, not really, FirstEnergy wins! FirstEnergy wins at this game every time because they get to build a new transmission line. It's never about whether to build, only where to put it. However, people aren't programmed to meekly accept a new transmission project as an inevitable fait accompli. Oh, no, they want to examine whether or not it should be built in the first place.
And on that point FirstEnergy is failing miserably. FirstEnergy says,
The people of Aurora, and its mayor, have proposed alternatives to the building of the transmission line on an abandoned rail line through the city. FirstEnergy isn't listening. In fact, the company will be holding one of its famous dog and pony shows, "where it will seek public input about the proposed routes and the siting process" next week. Why bother with one of those stilted "open house" displays, FirstEnergy? The city has said "no." It's not going to change its mind. Aurora wants to use the abandoned railway for a recreational path. In addition, there are 500 homes that will be affected by proximity to the proposed project whose owners won't be compensated at all for the drop in their property values.
What happens at a FirstEnergy "open house?" Attendees are greeted and shuffled through a series of "stations" where they can ogle a series of display posters with general information, ending at a table of aerial maps where residents can see how close the project will be to the place they call home. Citizens will be asked to fill out a little card asking which FirstEnergy designed route segments they prefer. The idea is that people will pick the route farthest away from their property, and the route with the least objections "wins." Well, not really, FirstEnergy wins! FirstEnergy wins at this game every time because they get to build a new transmission line. It's never about whether to build, only where to put it. However, people aren't programmed to meekly accept a new transmission project as an inevitable fait accompli. Oh, no, they want to examine whether or not it should be built in the first place.
And on that point FirstEnergy is failing miserably. FirstEnergy says,
FirstEnergy is planning to construct a new 69-kilovolt transmission line to connect two substations in the Aurora area. This new line will improve system redundancy and reliability, allowing much faster restoration times should power outages occur like those in recent years.
Did Aurora's transmission system fail a lot recently? I doubt it. It was more likely the distribution system. The transmission system connects generation to substations, and between substations. Substations step down the power before sending it out on distribution lines to your home or business. Almost all storm related outages take place on the distribution system. Transmission line failures are rare. Bigger lines, bigger rights of way, better right of way maintenance. So what good is another transmission line between substations when your outage is on the distribution system? More transmission lines are not the "fix" for power outages. FirstEnergy is only trying to scare the stupid to support its project.
FirstEnergy also reportedly told Aurora that it will have to pay $5 to 15M more to have the line buried. But if the line is solely for Aurora's benefit, isn't Aurora going to pay the entire cost of the project anyhow in their electric rates? It's probably not just for Aurora... and besides, FirstEnergy's estimate is probably as much a paper tiger as its outage scare tactics. FirstEnergy and other utilities routinely opine that buried transmission costs "ten times" as much as overhead. That figure has been proven overinflated on numerous projects. A more realistic rule of thumb would be two times as expensive. So if ten times is $5M, two times would be $1M. There, doesn't sound so scary anymore, does it? Whoever benefits from the transmission line is supposed to be the one who pays for it, and whoever benefits from the transmission line should also share in the cost of its burial to ameliorate its burden on Aurora and adjacent landowners.
FirstEnergy is looking at a hornet's nest on Monday. Hope they go all out and add a bee smoker station to their display. They're gonna need it.
FirstEnergy also reportedly told Aurora that it will have to pay $5 to 15M more to have the line buried. But if the line is solely for Aurora's benefit, isn't Aurora going to pay the entire cost of the project anyhow in their electric rates? It's probably not just for Aurora... and besides, FirstEnergy's estimate is probably as much a paper tiger as its outage scare tactics. FirstEnergy and other utilities routinely opine that buried transmission costs "ten times" as much as overhead. That figure has been proven overinflated on numerous projects. A more realistic rule of thumb would be two times as expensive. So if ten times is $5M, two times would be $1M. There, doesn't sound so scary anymore, does it? Whoever benefits from the transmission line is supposed to be the one who pays for it, and whoever benefits from the transmission line should also share in the cost of its burial to ameliorate its burden on Aurora and adjacent landowners.
FirstEnergy is looking at a hornet's nest on Monday. Hope they go all out and add a bee smoker station to their display. They're gonna need it.
RSS Feed