CHENANGO COUNTY – Over a year after starting the process, a date for resuming the state’s review of the $1.6 billion high voltage power line threatening the hills of Chenango County still hasn’t been set, but it could begin “in a matter of weeks,” a power line company spokesman said.
In the meantime, local opposition to the line is continuing to raise funds and develop legal strategies, representatives said Thursday.
New York Regional Interconnect Inc., a Canadian-backed firm, first announced its plans to build a 190-mile-long direct current power line through seven upstate counties, including 44 miles of Chenango, in March 2006.
However, that July, the company’s certification application, known as the Article VII – a series of studies, photos, plans and documents that take up several large binders – was deemed incomplete in a number of areas – including providing proof that the project would benefit the state’s electricity consumers – by the New York’s top energy authority, the Public Service Commission.
“The application states that the proposed project meets the recommendations for reliability benefits,” a July 2006 letter from the PSC states. “But does not describe what the reliability benefits are.”
Following the PSC ruling, NYRI officials said a completed filing would come in the spring of 2007. Later, the date changed to July, and was again pushed back to the end of this past summer. Now, it’s said the Article VII re-submission won’t come until at least this fall.
“It’s being finalized,” said NYRI spokesman David Kalson. “It will be in the near future. A matter of weeks.”
PSC public affairs spokeswoman Anne Dalton said there is no time limit on how long NYRI’s application can remain active, nor is there a deadline for re-filing.
“The ball is in their court,” she said. “Right now it’s status quo, our office has an incomplete filing ... there is no ticking clock (for them to complete it).”
In November, NYRI will move forward with a lawsuit against New York state challenging a law past in October 2006 that bans the power line company from using eminent domain to take private property. State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wants the suit thrown out.
Meanwhile, concerned citizens and local leaders continue to bolster support against the project, which would plant 115-foot-tall steel towers across six townships and through two villages in the county. Many up and down the route fear the line would drive out citizens, devastate local economies and environments as well as create unnecessary public health risks related to magnetic field emissions.
One opposition leader said time has not weakened their stance.
“We’re alive and kicking,” said Stop NYRI co-chair Eve Ann Shwartz. “And we’re kicking pretty hard. The group is pretty stable.”
Stop NYRI is a citizens group made up of Chenango and Madison County residents. The group is having a public informational meeting Monday at 7 p.m. in the parish hall of the Emmanuel Episcopal Church on 37 W. Main St. in Norwich. The meeting will focus on Stop NYRI’s efforts to create a historic district along the state Rt. 12 and railroad corridors in both counties.
“It should be an interesting meeting,” said Shwartz. “It will a great opportunity for more people to get involved.”
If NYRI completes it application and the U.S. Department of Energy follows through with plans to designate most the state and all of NYRI’s route a “National Interest Electric Transmission Corridor,” the power line could avoid the PSC process all together, guided by Washington’s push in the 2005 Energy Policy Act to fast track electricity upgrades. No date has been set for NIETC designations.
NYRI has repeatedly denied it’s waiting for the NIETC designation, stating the company “remains fully engaged” in the state process.
The PSC ruled last July that NYRI’s first Article VII failed to provide 10 pieces of visual and technical information, including proof their project benefits electric grid operations in New York state.