Power line
Cumberland Times-News
June 5, 2007
Battle lines are forming as opponents of a proposed regional power transmission line begin to organize a united effort against the plan.
More than 30 people from Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia gathered last week in Cumberland for a strategy session to sketch out the formation of a region-wide grassroots organization opposed to the project.
The proposed line would run from southwestern Pennsylvania to Mount Storm in Grant County, W.Va., then to Meadowbrook in Virginia and then to an interconnection to end at a Dominion/Loudoun substation in Virginia. Allegheny Power is in the process of gathering data concerning a specific route, and is still taking public comments on the location.
Power company officials said the electricity would be conveyed to a grid serving 51 million people in the Eastern U.S. According to the company, the grid could suffer potential blackouts by 2011 if the line is not completed.
Opponents take issue with those claims, with attendees at last week's meeting saying company profits - and not reliability - are primarily driving the project.
This is one of those legal battles you can see coming from miles and months away, but that's the way the system is designed. We applaud the private citizens who are forming up in opposition: They are the Davids to the corporate Goliaths, and the odds are heavy against them. Even if they don't prevail, though, such groups help keep companies honest in making decisions that will directly affect people's lives and homes.
But the issue of power reliability also affects our lives and homes. All power line projects are controversial and most generate opposition, but they are also necessary to maintain and improve a national power grid that has become overtaxed with population growth and the lack of infrastructure development like the proposed new line.
It promises to be a long, trying process. Through the struggle pro and con, however, we're hopeful that a solution can be found to minimize the impacts of the new line, yet provide the transmission capacity needed to ensure continued reliable electric service.
