SCC OKs power line
By Don Del Rosso
The State Corporation Commission (SCC) has approved construction of a 500,000-volt transmission line through the Piedmont.Dominion Virginia Power and Trains-Allegheny Interstate Co. began planning for the controversial tri-state line in 2006.
Dominion cheered the SCC ruling.
“As we said from the beginning of this process more than two and a half years ago, this transmission line is the best and only answer to keep the lights on in an important section of the country and our state beginning in the summer of 2011,” transmission vice president John Smatlak said.
The decision “affirms the soundness of our planning that has always placed our customers' needs for reliable electricity at the forefront,” Smatlak said.
Despite vigorous opposition from the Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC), community groups and hundreds of landowners, Dominion insisted it needed the line to avoid “rolling blackouts” in Northern Virginia.
Opponents argued conservation, new generation and infrastructure upgrades would preclude the need for the proposed line.
“We are indeed sympathetic to the opponents' position that planning for transmission, generation and conservation should be done in an integrated and holistic process, in order to arrive at the most rational and cost-effective plan to meet Virginia's future load growth and reliability transmission needs,” the three-member SCC board stated in its final order.
But, the commission said: “The law and facts applicable in this matter do not enable us to use a transmission line case and then use the result of that exercise as a legal basis to deny an application” when Dominion has demonstrated a “clear reliability need” for the proposed line.
Nor can the SCC deny Dominion's request when the proposed line “is an acceptable option” for satisfying such a need, the commission concluded in its 37-page ruling.
But the commission board affirmed an SCC hearing examiner's recommendation that the line could be built only if West Virginia and Pennsylvania approve it.
West Virginia has consented to the construction of its portion of the line.
Pennsylvania's decision-making board has not ruled on the project, although a three-judge administrative review panel recommended its denial.
PEC said it “remains very hopeful” that Pennsylvania will kill the proposal.
The SCC decision represents a setback for the Warrenton- based environmental group, which has spent more than $3 million to defeat the proposal.
“PEC and our legal team will be reviewing this decision over the next week to determine a course of action,” the organization said in a statement Tuesday afternoon.
Like all “participants” in the case, PEC may appeal the decision to the Virginia Supreme Court.
Participants have up to four months of an SCC final order to petition the court, according to commission spokesman Andy Farmer.
The proposed 240-mile line would cut through West Virginia, Virginia and Pennsylvania.
In Virginia, Dominion's 65-mile portion would track an existing power line corridor in Frederick, Warren, Rappahannock, Fauquier, Culpeper, Prince William and Loudoun counties.
The line would link a substation near Winchester with one near Arcola in Loudoun.
In a written statement, Corey Stewart (R), chairman of the Prince William Board of County Supervisors, blamed the decision on Gov. Tim Kaine (D) because Kaine recently appointed James Dimitri to the SCC. Dimitri had previously served as an attorney for Dominion.
“Appointing someone intimately involved in an industry to be a regulator is just bad leadership,” Stewart said. “If the governor claims this decision isn’t tainted by his appointment of an advocate for an industry to its regulating body, he’s crazy.”
Fauquier Supervisor Ray Graham said the SCC ruling disappointed but did not surprise him.
“Dominion has a lot of money,” Graham said. “As a result of having a lot of money, they can do a lot.”
The decision “was a long-time coming and we knew [Dominion] would pull out all the stops,” he said.
But, Graham said: “Dominion's going to need [Fauquier] some day, and it'll be interesting, the response that they get.”
The supervisor laughed and added: “We never forget. We're like elephants.”
The line would be suspended from steel towers up to 150-feet high.
Dominion would have to expand the existing right-of-way to accommodate the line.
Despite an unexpectedly long SCC review, the line should be operating by the summer of 2011, as planned, Dominion spokesman Jim Norvelle said.
It will take up to 18 months to build the 65-mile line, which will cost about $243 million, Norvelle said.