The Heavily Criticized “Aroostook Renewable Gateway” Suffers Another Setback
By Seamus Othot
December 23, 2023
Updated:December 23, 2023
The Maine Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) has been forced to delay development of the Aroostook Renewable Energy Gateway because the developers cannot work for the agreed upon price.
“LS Power made clear in its submission that it can no longer hold to its price, though nowhere in its brief or proposed transmission agreement did LS power indicate what the new price would need to be,” said Chairman Philip Bartlett of the MPUC at a meeting on Thursday.
LS Power was initially set to develop a 160-mile-long power transmission line, which would connect a massive proposed Aroostook County wind power farm to central and southern Maine.
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But now the MPUC is delaying the project in order to find another company to develop the line.
The MPUC will now allow other development companies to bid for the contract.
The collapse of the LS Power transmission line plan is just a latest in a series of failed or abandoned “green” energy projects attributed to untenable payment agreements.
In October, wind power giant Orsted scrapped plans for an offshore wind power facility off the coast of New Jersey.
Before that, Central Maine Power’s parent company, Avangrid, paid a massive fee in order to get out of an offshore wind development related to a project off the Massachusetts coast.
The transmission line, which would have connected to the “King Pine Wind Power” facility, has come under heavy criticism from energy ratepayers, landowners, and lawmakers.
The King Pine project is owned by Longroad Energy, a Boston-based company that is 92 percent owned by foreign entities, including the sovereign wealth fund of New Zealand.
The transmission line will increase energy rates for years, as electric bills will be used to pay for the construction of the line over time. Ratepayers will also pay an additional transmission fee to whoever ultimately builds the transmission line.
This additional rate increase would come as Maine has the second-fastest rising energy cost in the country, with an increase of 42 percent since 2019, second only to California’s energy costs.
Northern Maine landowners are concerned because the project may require a significant use of eminent domain to seize the land necessary for the 160-mile-long, 150-foot-wide corridor through the state.
Maine Lawmakers, such as Sen. Lisa Keim (R-Oxford) and Sen. Chip Curry (D-Waldo), and others, have tried to mitigate the damage done to Mainers by the transmission line.
Please continue reading at https://www.themainewire.com/2023/12/the-heavily-critisized-aroosto...
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Maine as Third World Country:
CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power
Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.
Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********
(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/
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Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law
Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future
"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."
https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/
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