August 2, 2004
The talking cure | Bangor Hydro tries to resurrectits Canadian transmission line by involving the public
By Sean Donahue
Point Lepreau, New Brunswick, lies at the end of a small peninsula on the Bay of Fundy, a little more than 100 miles from Orrington as the crow flies. But for anyone or anything trying to span that distance on land, the mileage is less important than the nature of the terrain between the two locations. That's the lesson Bangor Hydro-Electric Co. learned in 2002, when it sought a state permit to build a new, high-voltage electricity transmission line linking the Maine and New Brunswick grids.
Bangor Hydro's proposed route between Orrington and the Canadian border crossed vast areas of undeveloped land, where pristine rivers and lakes attract recreational users and provide habitat for endangered wild Atlantic salmon. The area also encompasses thousands of acres of industrial forestland. Because of those features, environmental groups led by the Natural Resources Council of Maine and International Paper, a major landowner along the line's proposed route, opposed the company's bid for a state Department of Environmental Protection permit to build the line.
In the face of that opposition, Bangor Hydro withdrew its application in 2002. But since last fall, the company has been working on a plan to build a new transmission line between Maine and Canada ˆ but not without adopting a new approach borne from its previous experience. Rather than selecting a route and waiting to see the public's reaction, Bangor Hydro has publicly proposed five potential routes for the line and invited conservation groups, area landowners, economic development organizations, local businesses and the public to offer their opinions on the merits of each.
The process, which Bangor Hydro calls "stakeholder consultation," also allowed interested groups ˆ including former opponents such as NRCM ˆ to help establish the criteria by which the company will choose a final route (a decision is expected by the end of August). The goal: Try to do as much upfront work as possible with inerested parties to make the subsequent permitting process a less contentious affair. "If you try to identify and resolve issues when you're already in a formal [permitting] process, it's too late. You don't have the ability to adjust your position or make accommodations," says Ray Robinson, Bangor Hydro's chief operating officer, who joined the company in 2001 when it was purchased by Nova Scotia-based energy company Emera. "But if long before you file applications for permits, you have a robust stakeholder consultation process, that is so important in identifying the real issues."
The approach also indicates how important the project is to Bangor Hydro. The new, 345-kilovolt transmission line would augment the sole existing electrical link between Maine and Canada, the 30-year-old, 345 kV Maine Power Co. line. With an estimated $90 million price tag, the new line would have about the same book value as all of Bangor Hydro's existing transmission assets, according to Rob Bennett, Bangor Hydro's general manager in charge of transmission and distribution asset management. The link also would increase Bangor Hydro's power importing capacity from 700 to 1,000 megawatts; likewise, the company's capacity to send power north into New Brunswick ˆ currently limited to just 150 megawatts and then only when traffic conditions are just right ˆ would increase to 400 megawatts.
Since Bangor Hydro makes its money through the long-distance transmission and local distribution of power, the ability to handle electricity more efficiently potentially could improve the company's own financial performance. But the additional capacity also could have a big impact on Maine's electricity producers and consumers. Considering the MEPCO line's age, Bangor Hydro and New Brunswick Power, the utility company building the Canadian portion of the line, are billing the project as vital infrastructure to improve the reliability of the New England/Maritime Canada grid, which is why the proposed line is generically known as the Northeast Reliability Interconnect.
Additional capacity also could create a more liquid power market between the two countries, allowing the regions to better capitalize on each others' generating capacity. Of particular interest is the fact that Maine and Canada have opposite peak demand times: Maine's highest demand typically occurs during the summer when customers need to power their air conditioners; Canada's peak occurs in winter to feed electric heaters. So the ability to tap additional electricity supplies during each region's peak periods could keep generators on both sides of the border busy, while potentially bringing down prices for customers.
As Bangor Hydro learned in 2002, though, the potential benefits of the line have to be considered alongside the perceived negative impacts of its construction. That's why, given the myriad environmental, economic and technical considerations that go into choosing a location for a power line, many of the stakeholders consulted by Bangor Hydro say it makes sense that the company talks to as many people as possible before settling on a route. "It's critical to get as much information as possible out there so people can make intelligent, rational, educated decisions," says Jonathan Daniels, president of Bangor-based Eastern Maine Development Corporation, who, along with his staff, met with Bangor Hydro officials to discuss the proposed line.
Choosing a route
To Daniels and EMDC, the most important issues surrounding the proposed transmission line are related to its broader economic impact. A region's utilities, like its transportation system and available workforce, are components of the overall business climate, says Daniels, and projects that strengthen the utility infrastructure and create the potential for lower electricity prices could help existing companies expand or attract new companies to the area. For that reason, EMDC has come out in favor of a new transmission line, but does not plan to offer an opinion on which route it should follow.
For conservation groups, though, the line's ultimate route ˆ and the environmental impact of its construction ˆ is the most important factor to consider. The line in question actually would be three wires, primarily strung along a series of wooden poles of varying heights erected within a 150- to 200-foot-wide right of way. Bangor Hydro's previously selected route (which is among the five potential routes under consideration this time around) would cross a sparsely populated area of Washington County where the Downeast Lakes Land Trust is working to put together a 332,000-acre conservation easement. The region includes more than 60 lakes and ponds with 445 miles of undeveloped shoreline, home to 10% of northern Maine's loon population, and some of Maine's most scenic rivers, such as the Machias.
Those resources draw thousands of visitors, particularly fishermen, to the region each year. And Steve Keith, executive director of the Downeast Lakes Land Trust, fears that the sight of the line cutting through the landscape will deter many of those visitors, besides potentially inflicting damage on animal habitat. "There are two dozen lodges in Washington County that cater primarily to fishermen, [who are] looking for the experience of an undeveloped lake to fish on," says Keith.
Obviously, many of Bangor Hydro's primary considerations in picking a route involve the cost and complexity of the project. Though Rob Bennett says the shortest, straightest route would be ideal, simply looking for the straightest line doesn't consider terrain challenges, or the opinions of local landowners and conservation groups. "[A transmission line] is not like a plant where you just have one parcel of land to worry about," says Bennett. "It's a linear project and a complicated permitting process, and we understand it does impact a lot of stakeholders."
For that reason, Bangor Hydro began its public consultation process last fall, meeting with state agencies, environmental and other citizens' groups, economic development organizations and local businesses to discuss what each party deemed important about the line and its route. Since then, LuAnn Williams, the company's corporate communications officer and manager of the stakeholder process, says she's had more than 50 meetings with dozens of different groups. She's also traveled around the region giving presentations on the project, answering questions and collecting feedback from the public.
Out of those meetings, Bangor Hydro developed 69 criteria it will use to judge the five different lines, hoping to balance the company's needs with the concerns and goals of the various stakeholders. The criteria include financial considerations such as the total number of structures needed for each route and the total construction costs; land-use factors such as the number of privately owned parcels the line would cross; environmental factors such as the amount of wetlands each route crosses, and the number of rare or endangered plant and animal species located in the route area; and recreational considerations such as lakes and wild and scenic rivers located near the route.
Already, that approach seems to be making the process less contentious, says Cathy Johnson, North Woods project director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine. "We've had an opportunity to explore our concerns openly and not in a formal hearing process," says Johnson. "It definitely is a different relationship."
Even so, Johnson says that among the five proposed routes NRCM still believes, as it did in the last round of discussions, that siting the new line alongside the existing MEPCO line would have the least environmental impact. But that option has some significant limitations for Bangor Hydro, starting with the fact that the route crosses the border at Orient, while NB Power already has received permits to build its side of the line starting from the Maine border near Baileyville, about 80 miles away. To change the route now would require NB Power to start its entire permitting process over again ˆ something Bangor Hydro officials would like to avoid, since work on the project can't begin until routes on both sides of the border are approved.
Short of starting over, NRCM believes what Bangor Hydro calls the MEPCO south alternative, which would go around much of the sensitive lakes region, is an improvement over the previous route. (See map, p. 25.)
Another entity that's particularly interested in the route is Montreal-based Domtar, which operates a pulp and paper mill in Woodland/Baileyville. Scott Beal, the mill's manager of compliance and technology, has met with Bangor Hydro not only to express general support for the project, but to request that the route pass as close to Baileyville as possible. Because the mill generates most of its own electricity, having a large transmission line nearby makes it possible for the plant to become a cogeneration facility, supplying electricity to the grid. "We have no definitive plans [to become a cogeneration facility], but with the line running through Baileyville there is the potential for future economic development," says Beal. "If the line doesn't come through, that possibility is closed."
South of the border
Besides choosing a route and lining up the necessary federal and state permits, Bangor Hydro's biggest challenge in building the transmission line is funding the $90 million construction cost. But in mid-July, the company received good news from ISO New England, the nonprofit organization that oversees operation of the New England electricity grid. ISO New England's reliability committee reviewed plans for the line and determined that the project would indeed enhance the reliability of the overall grid and provide benefits for every supplier and customer in New England, which means the cost must be split among the 230 companies that participate in the New England wholesale energy market.
Though increasing reliability is one of the Bangor Hydro's main objectives, the company and NB Power also expect the new line to increase the amount of power traded between New England and Canada ˆ a development of particular interest to NB Power. Under new provincial laws designed to deregulate the utility market, NB Power is being split up from a vertically integrated power company into four separate operating entities, with a goal of opening the wholesale electricity market to competition. That means NB Power's transmission subsidiary will be looking for competition among electricity suppliers. "If we can connect to New England we really are connecting to a fairly liquid market," says Brian Scott, director of transmission development for NB Power.
A deregulated NB Power actively shopping for electricity in New England could be good news for the generators who make up the New England Power Pool, since they will automatically have access to the new transmission line. But whether Maine's independent generators also would benefit remains unclear, says David Wilby, executive director of the Independent Energy Producers of Maine. His organization represents about 20 suppliers who generate electricity from renewable resources such as hydro, biomass and waste-to-energy plants. And while Wilby says those companies would love to sell power into Canada, he's not sure how much, if at all, demand from Canada may increase with the new line in place. "It's not entirely clear what this line could mean for our membersˆ but we're watching it carefully," says Wilby, who adds that his group does not have much interest in the particular route it takes.
Increased cross-border energy trading is also likely to produce savings for customers in Maine, says Bangor Hydro COO Robinson. Some of the savings could come simply by improving the efficiency of the existing line. Electricity generates heat as it travels across power lines ˆ and the more power flowing through a line, the hotter it gets, which means some electricity is lost to heat before it ever reaches customers. Bangor Hydro estimates it currently loses about five percent of the electricity it transmits over the MEPCO line to this phenomenon.
The more likely source of savings, though, is simply an increased ability to tap cheaper generating sources in Canada when possible, says Tom Welch, chairman of the Maine Public Utilities Commission. "Any time you combine two systems, or make it easy to send generation from one side of border to other side, you are very likely to have a more efficient dispatch overall," says Welch. "The most simple example is that when a low-cost unit in Canada isn't serving needs there, we could get that power into Maine to displace more expensive power here."
Though Welch is optimistic about the proposed line's potential impact, the PUC must still review a formal proposal from Bangor Hydro and issue a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity. In addition, Bangor Hydro must apply for both a federal Department of Energy Presidential Permit, a Maine Department of Environmental Protection permit, a Federal Water Quality Certification also issued by Maine DEP, final project approval from ISO New England and whatever municipal approvals are necessary. The company hopes to have completed the permitting process by early next year. But before it can take any of those steps, the company must choose a final route from the five possibilities.
Now, as the company closes in on that decision, Ray Robinson hopes the upfront work of meeting with stakeholders and soliciting feedback will deliver the best compromise between various goals and viewpoints across the region. And even though he expects the company's approach to deliver a smoother permitting process this time around, Robinson knows much of the important debate over the transmission line is yet to come. "We believe we'll be as well positioned as we can ever be, but I don't want to be overly bullish," says Robinson. "Permitting is always a difficult and contentious process, and though we believe we've done as much work as we can, these things can't ever be a fait accompli."
Bangor Hydro's proposed route between Orrington and the Canadian border crossed vast areas of undeveloped land, where pristine rivers and lakes attract recreational users and provide habitat for endangered wild Atlantic salmon. The area also encompasses thousands of acres of industrial forestland. Because of those features, environmental groups led by the Natural Resources Council of Maine and International Paper, a major landowner along the line's proposed route, opposed the company's bid for a state Department of Environmental Protection permit to build the line.
In the face of that opposition, Bangor Hydro withdrew its application in 2002. But since last fall, the company has been working on a plan to build a new transmission line between Maine and Canada ˆ but not without adopting a new approach borne from its previous experience. Rather than selecting a route and waiting to see the public's reaction, Bangor Hydro has publicly proposed five potential routes for the line and invited conservation groups, area landowners, economic development organizations, local businesses and the public to offer their opinions on the merits of each.
The process, which Bangor Hydro calls "stakeholder consultation," also allowed interested groups ˆ including former opponents such as NRCM ˆ to help establish the criteria by which the company will choose a final route (a decision is expected by the end of August). The goal: Try to do as much upfront work as possible with inerested parties to make the subsequent permitting process a less contentious affair. "If you try to identify and resolve issues when you're already in a formal [permitting] process, it's too late. You don't have the ability to adjust your position or make accommodations," says Ray Robinson, Bangor Hydro's chief operating officer, who joined the company in 2001 when it was purchased by Nova Scotia-based energy company Emera. "But if long before you file applications for permits, you have a robust stakeholder consultation process, that is so important in identifying the real issues."
The approach also indicates how important the project is to Bangor Hydro. The new, 345-kilovolt transmission line would augment the sole existing electrical link between Maine and Canada, the 30-year-old, 345 kV Maine Power Co. line. With an estimated $90 million price tag, the new line would have about the same book value as all of Bangor Hydro's existing transmission assets, according to Rob Bennett, Bangor Hydro's general manager in charge of transmission and distribution asset management. The link also would increase Bangor Hydro's power importing capacity from 700 to 1,000 megawatts; likewise, the company's capacity to send power north into New Brunswick ˆ currently limited to just 150 megawatts and then only when traffic conditions are just right ˆ would increase to 400 megawatts.
Since Bangor Hydro makes its money through the long-distance transmission and local distribution of power, the ability to handle electricity more efficiently potentially could improve the company's own financial performance. But the additional capacity also could have a big impact on Maine's electricity producers and consumers. Considering the MEPCO line's age, Bangor Hydro and New Brunswick Power, the utility company building the Canadian portion of the line, are billing the project as vital infrastructure to improve the reliability of the New England/Maritime Canada grid, which is why the proposed line is generically known as the Northeast Reliability Interconnect.
Additional capacity also could create a more liquid power market between the two countries, allowing the regions to better capitalize on each others' generating capacity. Of particular interest is the fact that Maine and Canada have opposite peak demand times: Maine's highest demand typically occurs during the summer when customers need to power their air conditioners; Canada's peak occurs in winter to feed electric heaters. So the ability to tap additional electricity supplies during each region's peak periods could keep generators on both sides of the border busy, while potentially bringing down prices for customers.
As Bangor Hydro learned in 2002, though, the potential benefits of the line have to be considered alongside the perceived negative impacts of its construction. That's why, given the myriad environmental, economic and technical considerations that go into choosing a location for a power line, many of the stakeholders consulted by Bangor Hydro say it makes sense that the company talks to as many people as possible before settling on a route. "It's critical to get as much information as possible out there so people can make intelligent, rational, educated decisions," says Jonathan Daniels, president of Bangor-based Eastern Maine Development Corporation, who, along with his staff, met with Bangor Hydro officials to discuss the proposed line.
Choosing a route
To Daniels and EMDC, the most important issues surrounding the proposed transmission line are related to its broader economic impact. A region's utilities, like its transportation system and available workforce, are components of the overall business climate, says Daniels, and projects that strengthen the utility infrastructure and create the potential for lower electricity prices could help existing companies expand or attract new companies to the area. For that reason, EMDC has come out in favor of a new transmission line, but does not plan to offer an opinion on which route it should follow.
For conservation groups, though, the line's ultimate route ˆ and the environmental impact of its construction ˆ is the most important factor to consider. The line in question actually would be three wires, primarily strung along a series of wooden poles of varying heights erected within a 150- to 200-foot-wide right of way. Bangor Hydro's previously selected route (which is among the five potential routes under consideration this time around) would cross a sparsely populated area of Washington County where the Downeast Lakes Land Trust is working to put together a 332,000-acre conservation easement. The region includes more than 60 lakes and ponds with 445 miles of undeveloped shoreline, home to 10% of northern Maine's loon population, and some of Maine's most scenic rivers, such as the Machias.
Those resources draw thousands of visitors, particularly fishermen, to the region each year. And Steve Keith, executive director of the Downeast Lakes Land Trust, fears that the sight of the line cutting through the landscape will deter many of those visitors, besides potentially inflicting damage on animal habitat. "There are two dozen lodges in Washington County that cater primarily to fishermen, [who are] looking for the experience of an undeveloped lake to fish on," says Keith.
Obviously, many of Bangor Hydro's primary considerations in picking a route involve the cost and complexity of the project. Though Rob Bennett says the shortest, straightest route would be ideal, simply looking for the straightest line doesn't consider terrain challenges, or the opinions of local landowners and conservation groups. "[A transmission line] is not like a plant where you just have one parcel of land to worry about," says Bennett. "It's a linear project and a complicated permitting process, and we understand it does impact a lot of stakeholders."
For that reason, Bangor Hydro began its public consultation process last fall, meeting with state agencies, environmental and other citizens' groups, economic development organizations and local businesses to discuss what each party deemed important about the line and its route. Since then, LuAnn Williams, the company's corporate communications officer and manager of the stakeholder process, says she's had more than 50 meetings with dozens of different groups. She's also traveled around the region giving presentations on the project, answering questions and collecting feedback from the public.
Out of those meetings, Bangor Hydro developed 69 criteria it will use to judge the five different lines, hoping to balance the company's needs with the concerns and goals of the various stakeholders. The criteria include financial considerations such as the total number of structures needed for each route and the total construction costs; land-use factors such as the number of privately owned parcels the line would cross; environmental factors such as the amount of wetlands each route crosses, and the number of rare or endangered plant and animal species located in the route area; and recreational considerations such as lakes and wild and scenic rivers located near the route.
Already, that approach seems to be making the process less contentious, says Cathy Johnson, North Woods project director for the Natural Resources Council of Maine. "We've had an opportunity to explore our concerns openly and not in a formal hearing process," says Johnson. "It definitely is a different relationship."
Even so, Johnson says that among the five proposed routes NRCM still believes, as it did in the last round of discussions, that siting the new line alongside the existing MEPCO line would have the least environmental impact. But that option has some significant limitations for Bangor Hydro, starting with the fact that the route crosses the border at Orient, while NB Power already has received permits to build its side of the line starting from the Maine border near Baileyville, about 80 miles away. To change the route now would require NB Power to start its entire permitting process over again ˆ something Bangor Hydro officials would like to avoid, since work on the project can't begin until routes on both sides of the border are approved.
Short of starting over, NRCM believes what Bangor Hydro calls the MEPCO south alternative, which would go around much of the sensitive lakes region, is an improvement over the previous route. (See map, p. 25.)
Another entity that's particularly interested in the route is Montreal-based Domtar, which operates a pulp and paper mill in Woodland/Baileyville. Scott Beal, the mill's manager of compliance and technology, has met with Bangor Hydro not only to express general support for the project, but to request that the route pass as close to Baileyville as possible. Because the mill generates most of its own electricity, having a large transmission line nearby makes it possible for the plant to become a cogeneration facility, supplying electricity to the grid. "We have no definitive plans [to become a cogeneration facility], but with the line running through Baileyville there is the potential for future economic development," says Beal. "If the line doesn't come through, that possibility is closed."
South of the border
Besides choosing a route and lining up the necessary federal and state permits, Bangor Hydro's biggest challenge in building the transmission line is funding the $90 million construction cost. But in mid-July, the company received good news from ISO New England, the nonprofit organization that oversees operation of the New England electricity grid. ISO New England's reliability committee reviewed plans for the line and determined that the project would indeed enhance the reliability of the overall grid and provide benefits for every supplier and customer in New England, which means the cost must be split among the 230 companies that participate in the New England wholesale energy market.
Though increasing reliability is one of the Bangor Hydro's main objectives, the company and NB Power also expect the new line to increase the amount of power traded between New England and Canada ˆ a development of particular interest to NB Power. Under new provincial laws designed to deregulate the utility market, NB Power is being split up from a vertically integrated power company into four separate operating entities, with a goal of opening the wholesale electricity market to competition. That means NB Power's transmission subsidiary will be looking for competition among electricity suppliers. "If we can connect to New England we really are connecting to a fairly liquid market," says Brian Scott, director of transmission development for NB Power.
A deregulated NB Power actively shopping for electricity in New England could be good news for the generators who make up the New England Power Pool, since they will automatically have access to the new transmission line. But whether Maine's independent generators also would benefit remains unclear, says David Wilby, executive director of the Independent Energy Producers of Maine. His organization represents about 20 suppliers who generate electricity from renewable resources such as hydro, biomass and waste-to-energy plants. And while Wilby says those companies would love to sell power into Canada, he's not sure how much, if at all, demand from Canada may increase with the new line in place. "It's not entirely clear what this line could mean for our membersˆ but we're watching it carefully," says Wilby, who adds that his group does not have much interest in the particular route it takes.
Increased cross-border energy trading is also likely to produce savings for customers in Maine, says Bangor Hydro COO Robinson. Some of the savings could come simply by improving the efficiency of the existing line. Electricity generates heat as it travels across power lines ˆ and the more power flowing through a line, the hotter it gets, which means some electricity is lost to heat before it ever reaches customers. Bangor Hydro estimates it currently loses about five percent of the electricity it transmits over the MEPCO line to this phenomenon.
The more likely source of savings, though, is simply an increased ability to tap cheaper generating sources in Canada when possible, says Tom Welch, chairman of the Maine Public Utilities Commission. "Any time you combine two systems, or make it easy to send generation from one side of border to other side, you are very likely to have a more efficient dispatch overall," says Welch. "The most simple example is that when a low-cost unit in Canada isn't serving needs there, we could get that power into Maine to displace more expensive power here."
Though Welch is optimistic about the proposed line's potential impact, the PUC must still review a formal proposal from Bangor Hydro and issue a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity. In addition, Bangor Hydro must apply for both a federal Department of Energy Presidential Permit, a Maine Department of Environmental Protection permit, a Federal Water Quality Certification also issued by Maine DEP, final project approval from ISO New England and whatever municipal approvals are necessary. The company hopes to have completed the permitting process by early next year. But before it can take any of those steps, the company must choose a final route from the five possibilities.
Now, as the company closes in on that decision, Ray Robinson hopes the upfront work of meeting with stakeholders and soliciting feedback will deliver the best compromise between various goals and viewpoints across the region. And even though he expects the company's approach to deliver a smoother permitting process this time around, Robinson knows much of the important debate over the transmission line is yet to come. "We believe we'll be as well positioned as we can ever be, but I don't want to be overly bullish," says Robinson. "Permitting is always a difficult and contentious process, and though we believe we've done as much work as we can, these things can't ever be a fait accompli."
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