Maine legislature considers blocking seizure of private land to build power lines

VOTE OUT EVERY SINGLE LAST SOB WHO SUPPORTS EMINENT DOMAIN FOR THESE TOTAL SCAM TRANSMISSION LINES AND EVERY SOB WHO SUPPORTS ANY NEW TRANSMISSION FOR BS WIND POWER

March 6, 2024
Stephen Singer
Press Herald

EXCERPTS:

Maine legislators are looking for middle ground between developers of electricity transmission lines needed to deliver clean energy and property owners demanding more of a role in deciding where giant towers are built.

Lawmakers on Tuesday took up a proposal that would ban the use of eminent domain – the government’s power to take private property for a public use at “just compensation” – to build a transmission line. 

It’s one of several bills this session that could change how such projects are reviewed and approved. Other pieces of legislation governing and studying transmission lines are scheduled for separate reviews.

The state needs more transmission lines to meet its clean energy goals, which require broader reliance on wind and solar energy, battery storage and energy efficiency.

Regulators in December rejected a project that would have connected a large wind farm in northern Maine to the New England grid via up to 160 miles of overhead lines between Aroostook County and greater Augusta. The state Public Utilities Commission scuttled the transmission line — called the Aroostook Renewable Gateway Project — after developer LS Power said it could not hold to its price. 

For months, residents also voiced concerns about towering transmission lines that would cut through farmland and forests, and several towns along the planned line have passed measures to temporarily block it.

The wind farm in northern Maine that would generate the energy to be transmitted along the power line would be the largest onshore wind project east of the Mississippi River. Its turbines could generate as much as 3.2 billion kilowatts, which is enough electricity to power 450,000 typical homes — more than half of Maine’s housing inventory.

Maine ratepayers would pay for 60% of the project’s electricity output and Massachusetts has committed to the other 40%.

“Maine’s and Massachusetts’ energy gain would be a burden on the backs of rural Maine property owners,” Carole L. Getchell of Corinth told lawmakers in written testimony. Eminent domain shifts the balance of power to the “taker, not the property owner,” she said. Corinth, a town of about 2,900 people in Penobscot County, is in the path of the proposed LS Power transmission line.........................

...........................While Maine has been looking to its expansive access to the Atlantic Ocean for offshore wind, the Aroostook power line would be a significant overland wind power project.

Supporters of the $2 billion wind farm say it’s critical for the rural region’s economic development.

Sen. Chip Curry, D-Waldo, who presented the eminent domain legislation, L.D. 2087, on Tuesday told the Legislature’s Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee that a group negotiating details is looking to protect the rights of property owners “without killing all transmission lines.”..............................

...............................And the Maine Renewable Energy Association said without eminent domain, the northern Maine project might not attract interest from developers.

https://www.pressherald.com/2024/03/06/legislature-considers-blocki...

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