Clean Line:
“Oh, won’t somebody think of the farmers!
No, wait… not those farmers… these
farmers.”
Sigh… I have so
much to say. I started this post about three weeks ago in response to Diana Rivera’s Department of Energy Draft Congestion Study comment on behalf of Clean Line . But since that time we’ve had an opposition meeting, Mr. Hurtado’s response,
the IRP update, the TRA hearing on Clean Line’s petition for utility status,
and the interim study meeting in AR… There’s no really good way to hit
everything except by topic, so that’s where we’ll start.
Is it 7000MW,
3500MW, or 4000MW? And why won’t Clean Line commit to not adding a second line…
in writing?
So the best
thing I can say for Rivera’s comment is that it was nice of her to ask the
Department of Energy to “update the project description” for P&E and GBE “to
reflect changes implemented since 2012”:
“Namely,
Plains & Eastern Clean Line is no longer under development as the two-phase
7,000 MW
project originally envisioned, and Grain Belt Express Clean Line was extended
200 miles to reach a stronger point of interconnection in Indiana also while
maintaining an interconnection in Missouri.”
Good for us,
bad for our friends to the north, whose correction officially included an extra
200 miles for a total length of 750 miles.
Good for us except that Clean Line
has never said, in writing, that they won’t come back later to revive the 2nd
phase of P&E. Something tells me that a successful petition for 1222 might
mean a lot more of this kind of development in general. Handily, they’d have
plans…well…handy.
Also of note
was Rivera’s description of P&E:
“The line will originate
in the Oklahoma Panhandle and will be capable of delivering 3,500 MW of wind
power to an interconnection point in Tennessee and 500 MW to an interconnection
point in Arkansas.”
So
now we’re at 4000MW. This was confirmed by Clean Line testimony at the TRA
hearing. Interesting, as for some reason, the majority of us were under the
impression the line topped out at 3500MW. Maybe we misunderstood all along?
The
angry cynic in me wonders if this has anything to do with their proposed converter station (supposedly, they’re eyeing land north of Russellville for it. Have they
contacted landowners yet?) which Clean Line is actually under no obligation
to build. Will they actually go through with the expense of building one if
money comes up short on the way to Tenn? Is Arkansas' 500MW promise nothing but
a feel-good gesture? And who’s going to buy the 500MW anyway?
Which
brings us to…
No,
not those customers… These customers
“Consistent with its negotiated rate authority
granted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”), Plains & Eastern
Clean Line conducted an open solicitation and received transmission service
requests from developers of wind projects with total capacity far exceeding the
capacity of the transmission line. In advance of the solicitation, developers
of over 16,000 MW of wind projects in the Oklahoma Panhandle region responded
to a request for information (“RFI”) regarding the need for transmission
service.”
Unfortunately, we don’t know what “over” means
numerically. Assuming that if they had over 17,500 MW we’d be talking about
“nearly” 18,000MW… This means that of all their P&E solicitation, only
1,000 to maybe 1,500MW came from actual end users customers… or utilities
(which Clean Line is not in AR nor yet in TN). The rest came from, you guessed it, the generators.
If you build it, they will come?
1,000 to 1,500 MW… So the interest from utilities
wanting to buy power was less than one third to less than one half of the total
capacity of the line? Ouch.
Why? Maybe because the project is so uncertain.
But what’s more important here is that, yet
again, Clean Line is attempting to justify the line based on generation rather
than end use. Why is that important? Because we shouldn’t take people’s land
forcibly based on potential generation and without a clearly defined and
expressed user need. A vague “large
and growing demand for renewable energy” doesn’t count. We just shouldn’t. It’s
unethical and it opens up a huge can of worms. Try as Clean Line and the DoE
might to call constraint a “need”, it isn’t. Especially when said "constrained" wind farms
haven’t been developed.
You can think of this project as a three-legged
stool: producers, end users, and regulators/permitting. If any one of those
breaks, down we go. And worse, none of those legs are even screwed in yet.
We’ve got wind farms that haven’t been built because they’re waiting for
transmission (and, I’d guess, the future of the PTC), end users waiting for
producers and permitting, and permitting that’s going to take another year at
best and uses an untested section of law ripe for litigation. That’s a hell of
a risk for anyone to get on board with, especially landowners being asked to
sign perpetual easements. Especially considering the company doing the asking
actually advocated for a less transparent process for a governmental study that
essentially belongs to the taxpayers:
“Clean
Line acknowledges the difficulty or impossibility of accessing uniform data
across the country and supports efforts to improve data quality and
availability in the future. The issue of data access requires serious
examination, and DOE may wish to consider using data that is not publicly
available. Making data publicly available may discourage sharing of
competitively sensitive information that could prove helpful in thoroughly
studying congestion on the bulk electric system.”
But what
about the farmers?
So what
really set me off about Rivera’s comment was this section:
“These are real projects, many of which have
land leased for wind turbines from
farmers
seeking new sources of income, as drought has made traditional farming
livelihoods uncertain. Wind power represents new hope for drought-resistant
income and economic development in regions of the country otherwise struggling
with diminishing populations.”
Why? Because it’s a cheap ploy to garner an emotional
response. Of course everyone is worried about the sustainability of farming in
the Midwest given the changing climate and increasing prevalence of drought. But
to use that as a mechanism to justify the forced condemnation of land belonging
to farmers in other states, affecting their financial security and
independence, doesn’t make any sense at all. Maybe these developers should have
had a plan to sell energy to more local markets BEFORE signing lease agreements
with farmers. Maybe they shouldn’t have made promises to people that they
couldn’t keep.
And what Rivera fails to acknowledge here is
the very simple fact that the farmers she’s referring to in her comment had a
choice. They were able to choose whether or not to participate in development
projects. Clean Line, for all their “we are committed to negotiating easements”
talk is still pursuing the right to eminent domain as a means to complete this
transmission project. And, yes, they will cut through farms in Arkansas. And,
no, not everyone wants to participate.
Which brings me to a question we heard
repeatedly from the TRA directors in reference to the opposition letters they
received from landowners in Arkansas, including ours, which has about 350
signatures…
What went wrong in Arkansas?
The directors at the TRA heard from a landowner who talked about how wonderful her experience with Clean Line
had been. Their question about why landowners in Arkansas seemed so
unsupportive of the project was met with the assertion that it was simply
because there was less certainty in the route in here and, therefore, less
landowner contact.
Personally, I think it probably has more to do
with the fact that Clean Line NEEDS the TRA on board. I think they were probably on
their best behavior in Tennessee because they had to be, since SWPA doesn’t have
jurisdiction for siting the line there. Not to mention that attempting to buy
seventeen miles of easement is a lot easier than buying two-hundred and
something. In fact, Clean Line bragged about being able to obtain 40 out of 50
easements in TN (the last 10 are apparently a little cautious of the
three-legged stool and are waiting to see if Clean Line actually gets routing
authority. We assume, anyway, since that’s what Clean Line said and none of
those landowners were present to say differently)… And they did it without
eminent domain, so it can be done. It would be very interesting to see the
terms and conditions of those agreements.
They were right, though, about having less
landowner contact in Arkansas. After our Dover meeting, which was attended by
nearly 100 people (or a little less than 1/6th of the total number
of people who signed into all the DoE/CL scoping meetings combined...across three states),
Mario Hurtado talked to our town newspaper about all the outreach they’ve done
in Arkansas…
Um, maybe they need a new outreach coordinator.
When Chris Hardy went to Arkansas Tech University in Russellville several weeks
ago to pitch, excuse me, present the project to the students in the Chemistry
Club, among other groups, did they take the time to hold “office hours” in the
town a few miles up Highway 7 that would be directly impacted by the line? No.
It is amazing to me that Clean Line continues to talk
about outreach as if they’re patting themselves on the back. Notice that
“stakeholder” does not equal “landowner”. No, meetings with NGO’s, contractors,
and the few landowners lucky enough to get “the unicorn” (Clean Line’s postcard)
or read about “office hours” (advertised the same day as the event) in the
local papers (which in very rural areas, often have to be mailed and don’t
arrive until late in the day) does not count as informing the people whose land
you want to use to construct a transmission line. There’s this thing called a
registered letter. It’s awesome.
In an attempt to reach as many locals as
possible, our group actually went door to door before our meeting. Since we were short on time and corporate sponsorship, we just hit one road on the route. We
were able to speak with eleven people directly. Only a few knew anything about
the line. One person knew they were in the proposed corridor.
One.
Nice
job fellas.
If you liked it, then you should have put a
ring on it.
