Capon Valley Coalition

WV Public Broadcasting reported yesterday:

State Public Service Commission prepares for lengthy hearing on proposed high voltage power line
By Cecelia Mason

Here is the transcript of the report. You can listen to the report on the WV Public Broadcasting Web site.

Studio lead: The state Public Service Commission will spend most of
the next two weeks trying to determine whether to approve a high
voltage power line across north central West Virginia. Allegheny Power
in partnership with Virginia’s Dominion Power wants to build the line
to bring more power to the eastern U-S. Cecelia Mason has more:

Mason: The Trans Allegheny Interstate Line would cross six West
Virginia counties on its 114 mile journey linking southwestern
Pennsylvania to northern Virginia. The state P-S-C will begin 10 days of hearings Wednesday to determine whether the line is necessary. P-S-C spokeswoman Sarah Robertson says the witness list is lengthy:

Robertson: Obviously there are several witnesses for the company, for
TRAILCo. There are several pro se interveners which like I said are
citizens who have a vested interest in the case. There are witnesses
from the Sierra Club, CPV Warren, Consumer Advocates Division,
homeowners groups.

Mason: Allegheny Power subsidiary TRAILCo applied last March for
permission to build the power lines. Since then the P-S-C has
conducted a dozen hearings in six different cities so the public could
comment. Robertson says the list of concerns is long:

Robertson: It goes from people not wanting it to be on their property.
There are environmental concerns. They have medical concerns. What is
the high voltage power line going to do to their land, the animals, the
run off. There are just so many concerns that these interveners have.

Mason: Consultants and Public Service Commission staff have also
expressed concern. They are recommending the Commission not approve
the line. Robertson says despite the staff and consultant’s
recommendation, the Commission could still approve
it.

Robertson: The Commission will have to decide whether it’s in the
public’s convenience and necessity to have this power line put in. Is
it needed? Is it convenient? Is it necessary? These are the things
that the Commission has to look at. And we’re not talking about 20
people. We’re talking about the northern part of the state.

Mason: The big picture is some are saying it is necessary for the
power grid on the east coast. Does this Commission think about that or
are they only concerned with whether it’s necessary for West Virginia?
Robertson: Obviously the Commission is charged with, concerning itself
with the needs of the people of West Virginia. It will look at whether
its needed for the power grid. Whether that will come into its final
decision making process is yet to be seen.

Mason: Robertson says the TRAILCo hearing begins Wednesday morning at P-S-C headquarters in Charleston. The Commission will hear testimony
through Saturday and will continue the hearing next week, Monday through
Saturday. For West Virginia Public Broadcasting I’m Cecelia Mason in
Shepherdstown.

If you caught the previous entry about the AP story, you know that the Consumer Advocate Division of the West Virginia Public Service Commission has reached an agreement with Allegheny Power over TrAIL and will no longer oppose the TrAIL power line.

The 21-page agreement is available on the WV PSC Web site.

AP reports today on the ABCMoney site:

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) - Allegheny Energy and the state Public Service Commission’s Consumer Advocate Division reached a settlement Monday over the routing of a new multistate power line in northern West Virginia that would supply free electricity to affected residential landowners.

‘We think it’s good,’ Consumer Advocate Byron Harris said of the four-part settlement. ‘We think we have hopefully captured for landowners many of the conditions they requested if the line is to be built.’

Affected landowners would receive up to 1,000 kilowatts of free electricity a month for the life of the line. The deal is worth about $70 a month and only applies to residential customers.

The line is expected to affect 500 property owners, but Allegheny Energy spokesman Allen Staggers said he didn’t know how many customers would be eligible for the free electricity.

The provision is a first for Greensburg, Pa.-based Allegheny Energy. Staggers and Harris likened it to natural gas companies providing free gas to property owners when wells are drilled.

‘It’s one of the ways we can address some of the concerns about just and fair compensation since this line will be on the property for a long time,’ Staggers said.

The settlement also says the utility will not clear cut the line’s right of way and will not conduct aerial herbicide spraying to control vegetation along the route.

In exchange, the consumer advocate’s division will not oppose the need for the transmission line and will tell the PSC that a proposed route through West Virginia is acceptable.

‘We don’t support the power line,’ Harris said. ‘We just don’t contest it.’

The Public Service Commission starts hearings Wednesday on whether the power line is needed.

Allegheny Energy has to convince the PSC that the Pennsylvania-to-Virginia line is needed before it can move ahead on the project. The line would be built by Allegheny Energy subsidiary Trans-Allegheny Interstate Line Co.

‘The two big thresholds we have to cross in our filing with the PSC is there is a need for the line and … we picked an appropriate route,’ Staggers said. ‘This agreement addresses both of those.’

Consultants hired by the state have urged the PSC to reject the proposal.

In documents filed with the PSC, they question whether the line would help West Virginia consumers and suggest the interstate line is not the most cost-effective option for easing potential power outages in the Eastern United States.

PJM Interconnection, the organization responsible for the transmission grid for a 13-state area, has said without the 500-kilovolt, 240-mile transmission line between Washington County, Pa., and Loudoun County, Va., the stability of the grid and reliable flow of electricity within the region could not be guaranteed.

The Trans-Allegheny Interstate Line would pass through Monongalia, Preston, Tucker, Grant, Hardy and Hampshire counties and would be built by Allegheny and Dominion Energy of Richmond, Va.

You can find the Allegheny Power press release about this on the APTrailinfo.com Web site.

The following piece ran on page one of The Dominion Post on Sunday.

BY J. MILES LAYTON The Dominion Post

West Virginia has joined a lawsuit with another 14 states in challenging federal authority that may deprive states of the power to site power line projects.

There is a lawsuit pending before the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals to clarify what happens if a state denies approval of power line projects, according to court documents. Last year the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued a ruling that if a State Commission denied a transmission line project based upon the merits of the public case it was the same as withholding approval, therefore, the utility could then appeal to FERC under the Energy Policy Act to get approval of the line.

“If the state says ‘no’ based on the merits of the case, the utility is not entitled to a ‘do over’ at the federal level,” said Bob Lazaro, director of communication for the Piedmont Environmental Council, of Virginia, which filed its lawsuit in August.

Last month, the states filed a brief in support of the PEC’s position. The states are New York, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, West Virginia and Wyoming.

“We join a lot of amicus briefs filed by state attorney generals that seek to preserve states’ regulatory power in the face of business interests that want to develop uniform national standards, which have the effect of watering down state powers,” said Silas Taylor, senior deputy attorney general for West Virginia.

The state’s Public Service Commission will be monitoring the lawsuit, PSC officials said.

Allegheny Energy wants the West Virginia Public Service Commission to approve construction of a 500-kilovolt transmission line. The 240-mile project would start in Pennsylvania, pass through West Virginia and continue to northern Virginia.

Allegheny said the lawsuit has no effect on its application for the project under consideration by the PSC.

“The lawsuit doesn’t change the fact that we still intend to work with state regulators not only in West Virginia, but in Pennsylvania and Virginia,” said Allen Staggers, an Allegheny Energy spokesman.

In West Virginia, the line would run 114 miles through Monongalia, Preston, Tucker, Grant, Hardy and Hampshire counties. The Trans Allegheny Interstate Line Co. is managing the project. PJM is the regional power-grid operator.

In other news, the PSC will begin its evidentiary hearings Wednesday. Several groups and people filed opening statements Friday with the PSC.

Allegheny’s statement makes arguments in favor of the proposed project.

“All of our filings have led up to this point,” Staggers said. “The testimony that we intend to discuss will fully address the … Public Service Commission’s concerns and will also demonstrate the need for the line and that this line is the appropriate solution for the reliability problems that PJM has identified.”

The PSC staff’s opening statement recommends that the project not be approved by the commission.

“The company has failed to meet its state statutory requirements of evaluating the need for action, balanced with environmental impacts and economic benefits, at the expense, at least in part, of West Virginia ratepayers and landowners in accordance with the statutory provisions of the state code,” the statement said.

Though the PSC has yet to make a decision about the TrAIL project, the staff’s position sends a signal to the commission about why the line should not be approved, said John Balasko, vice president of the Halleck Community Association, which opposes the project.

“While I am not an attorney or claim to know how the PSC commissioners will interpret the applicable paragraphs of the state code, I do believe that we have the momentum going into the evidentiary hearings and that TrAILCo will have an uphill battle to overcome all the legal opposition that it will face,” he said. “Opening statements submitted to the commission on Friday were overwhelmingly against construction of the line.”

Staggers said, “It’s not uncommon for the staff and a utility to have differing opinions on issues.”

PSC Consumer Advocate Byron Harris filed a statement in support of the Grafton Alternate Route because “it minimizes the amount of greenfield right-of-way that must be acquired, and maximizes the reuse and paralleling of transmission line right-of-way.”

The alternative route would parallel Allegheny’s existing 500 kilovolt power lines from Fort Martin to Pruntytown and on to Mount Storm, a corridor that has been in use for about 40 years. The alternative route starts in Monongalia County, then crosses into Marion and Taylor counties.

Allegheny favors the current proposed route. Staggers said the preferred route is shorter, and affects fewer homes and properties.

The West Virginia Energy Users Group’s opening statement said the people who mainly benefit from the power line project are not from West Virginia. According to the group’s paperwork filed with the PSC “the WVEUG is an ad hoc association of energy-intensive industrial customers receiving electric service from Allegheny Power.”

The group includes Mylan Pharmaceuticals, DuPont, Mittal Steel, Novelis Corp., SKF Pulp Recycling US Inc., UCAR Carbon. Inc., U.S. Silica, Quad Graphics Inc., the Linde Group and Esroc Cement Co.

Staggers said West Virginia and other states in the region could see blackouts and brownouts as early as 2011 if the line is not built.

With the evidentiary stage of hearings on Allegheny Power’s TrAIL application set to start Wednesday (Jan. 9), the staff of the West Virginia Public Service Commission says the plan comes up short in five areas: Need, reliability, economic benefits, line routing and regulatory obligations.

The staff laid out their objections in an opening statement made public on Friday (Jan. 4).

Here are excerpts:

After reviewing the Company’s March 30, 2007 application and pre-filed direct testimony; the Company’s August 10,2007 supplemental materials and testimony; the prefiled
direct and rebuttal testimony of the Staffs own expert witnesses; as well as the Intervenors pre-filed direct and rebuttal testimony in response to the Company’s case in chief, the Staff recommends the filed certificate application by TrAILCo be denied. The Company has failed to meet its State statutory requirement of evaluating the need for action, balanced with environmental impacts and economic benefits, at the expense, at least in part, of West Virginia ratepayers and landowners in accordance with the statutory provisions of West Virginia Code f 24-2-1 la (d)( 1) and (2). The Staff finds that the application is deficient in these significant areas:

I. Need - 1) Lack of showing of the reasonableness of the PJMRTO load forecasts underlying the claimed need for TrAIL in 201 1. 2) Insufficient demonstration that TrAIL serves as a most economical or cost-effective means of resolving the outages that PJM reports are likely to occur in 201 1 in the absence of TrAIL. In particular including a failure (I) to evaluate the ability to reduce end-use power demands responsible for the overloads; (ii) to evaluate additions of new generation; and (iii) most significantly to evaluate upgrading existing transmission facilities.

II. Reliability - 1) Lack of showing of necessity of TrAIL for reliability purposes in West Virginia and PJMRTO in 201 1. 2) Insufficient analysis of benefits of upgrading existing facilities. 3) Insufficient analysis of impacts of major planned transmission facilities in West Virginia e.g., PATH. (This is the planned joint venture 765kV transmission line of Allegheny Energy, Inc. and American Electric Power, that is known as Potomac-Appalachian Transmission Highline, L.L.C., consisting of 290-miles of extra-high voltage line to be constructed primarily in West Virginia.)

III. Economic Benefits - 1) Failure to utilize the requirements of integrated resource planning in evaluating need for action. 2) Failure to demonstrate the reasonableness of the load forecasts on which the claimed need for TrAIL is based. 3) The magnitude of the economic benefits of TrAIL remain insufficiently documented by calculation and the corresponding results are not
reasonably supported. In particular the Staff witnesses take issue with the Company’ s calculation of the localized project expenditure amounts claimed to be made in the geographic area, the reasonableness of the ‘multipliers’ implicitly incorporated in the spillover analysis and the adverse property impacts calculated by TrAILCo.

IV. Line Routing - 1) TrAILCo’s filing does not demonstrate that the route referred to as ‘Preferred Route’ for which the Company is seeking approval presents an acceptable balance between reasonable power needs and reasonable environmental impacts for the affected population. In particular the Staff witness’ testimony will demonstrate that Route A has significantly less impacts. 2) TrAILCo has not committed to reasonable mitigation measures associated with line routing, including: purchase of properties within an adequate buffer zone (Staffs witness proposes 400 feet of centerline), a prohibition of aerial spraying in the maintenance of this line, adoption of ommission previously stated conditions in Appalachian Power Company case, Case No. 9003, Commission Order entered May 18, 1979.

V. Regulatory Compact Obligations - Under the TrAILCo proposal the regulatory compact obligations of a utility operating in the State of West Virginia have not been fulfilled, specifically: 1) TrAILCo has not committed to recognizing this Commission’s exclusive ratemaking authority over the recovery of transmission costs from retail customers in West Virginia. 2) TrAILCo has not committed to recognizing the Commission’s authority for jurisdictional allocation of transmission costs to West Virginia retail customers. 3) TrAILCo has not demonstrated the flow through benefits to West Virginia ratepayers in dollars for off system sales transactions.