Proposed electric upgrade could bring $1.6B investment

By Elna Seabrooks
Staff Writer
    HOULTON — A $1.6 billion projected total investment – the biggest ever in the state of Maine – was the topic for some 22 area professionals as a series of educational meetings in Aroostook County concluded last week with a business breakfast and presentation in Houlton. If approved, The Maine Power Connection (MPC), a proposed project of Maine Public Service (MPS) and Central Maine Power Company (CMP) would construct a 345 KV transmission line to connect the northern and southern Maine grids. The 200 mile line, alone costing $625 million, would run from Limestone to Detroit to allow increased capacity for generation of wind power.
Houlton Pioneer Times photograph/Elna Seabrooks
POWER BREAKFAST — Leaders Encouraging Aroostook Development (LEAD) coordinated a series of business breakfasts for presentations on a proposed transmission line to carry wind-generated electricity to the rest of New England.  The series concluded in Houlton last Thursday, Sept. 25.
     MPS President Brent Boyles said the current grid system won’t support increased electricity transmission from wind development. “The load that the wind developers want to serve is in Boston and Connecticut. And, so, in order to get 800 megawatts from northern Maine all the way to southern New England, you need a large transmission line and you need a line that has enough capacity to carry all that load, all that generation, to the market.”
     Boyles says by displacing non-renewable energy, like high-priced oil and gas, with free wind energy the supply portion of energy costs theoretically should go down. MPC transmits but does not generate electricity and has requested membership for 2008 in the Independent System Operator (ISO) New England regional system plan.
    MPC anticipates 930 temporary construction jobs and 95 permanent jobs related to wind generation with additional jobs related to transmission. Boyles says the cost of the proposed plan would be raised through investors, sponsors and ratepayers outside northern New England.
     However, John Clark, manager of Houlton Water Company (HWC), a municipally-owned utility that delivers but does not generate electricity, has reservations.  He says while jobs and tax revenues are a good thing, there’s not enough of a benefit to offset potential costs of the project which is supported by Governor John Baldacci.
    “The Governor wants all this renewable energy because he wants to use it in the rest of Maine which doesn’t have enough.  We have 100 percent renewable energy in northern Maine.  My concern is that Northern Maine is going to supply the renewable energy for the rest of the state and southern New England and it’s going to be on the backs of ratepayers.”
     Clark also says two years ago the Maine Public Utilities Commission ruled that the northern Maine line is reliable and any additional work for this area would be “gold plating.”  And, since northern New England is getting its renewable energy from wood and hydro-powered generators it should not be forced into the Independent System Operator (ISO) Grid which is what the MPC proposes.  If northern New England is forced into ISO, he says a formula is needed so that HWC customers won’t be forced to pay increased  rates incurred by the plan.
    If approved, MPC wants to begin construction in July 2009 with the first 300 megawatts of wind power on line in the Bridgewater area by November 2010.