War over CMP corridor enters new phase – a jury trial

A trial begins April 10 that could help decide the fate of New England Clean Energy Connect, the planned 145-mile line backed by Central Maine Power Co. A jury of nine Cumberland County residents is scheduled to hear testimony about land claims related to the transmission line corridor.

A lawsuit involving more than 2 million pages of evidence will confront jurors, who must decide whether Central Maine Power's parent has vested rights in the project Mainers voted to kill in 2021.

The jury won’t rehash the merits of those actions. Instead, it will decide the facts around a narrow legal doctrine, known as vested rights, that will determine if NECEC is entitled to build on the corridor. The jury must decipher, in the words of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, “whether NECEC acquired a cognizable property right that the Maine Constitution protects from being impaired by retroactive legislation.”

Lawyers in firms contacted by the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram declined to discuss the case on the record. The Natural Resources Council and Saviello declined to be interviewed. NextEra didn’t respond to an interview request.

War over CMP corridor enters new phase – a jury trial - CentralMain...

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Comment by Penny Gray on March 27, 2023 at 7:45pm

Skyrocketing electricity rates are a big wake up call to all those who opposed NECEC, if they connect the dots properly.  This requires independent thought.

Comment by Dan McKay on March 27, 2023 at 5:05pm

This court should have remanded this back to the voters, who can now consider the price of electricity is tied to billion-dollar ventures like the Aroostook fiasco bought and paid by Maine ratepayers, while NECEC is bought and paid for by Massachusetts ratepayers. 

And if you think Western Maine is a poor part of the state being taken advantage of by CMP and Quebec, remember where Sugarloaf Mountain Resort, Saddleback Mountain Resort and Sunday River Resort are located, and they use a lot of electricity and they don't have windmills on their peaks.

Comment by Penny Gray on March 27, 2023 at 10:44am

Comment from the CM article: 

This is not about the environmental impact of the project. This trial deals with one question; Once NECEC obtained a legal permit, did they aquire vested rights? This Jury will need to focus on a limited legal issue and tune out all the other noise. Consider if you received a permit to build a house, you started to build, halfway through the citizens of Maine passed a referendum retroactively stopping you from building your house. Would you just accept the losses and move on.

That being said, this is an emotional subject for many who believe that the only solution to our energy problems should be locally sourced wind and solar, to which the environmental costs do not apply.

Comment by Richard McDonald/Saving Maine on March 27, 2023 at 7:50am

A jury trial is a major dodge by Judge Murphy. IMO, she does not want to be responsible for the final decision on this highly visible, controversial project. It's a complicated question to put before a jury given the constant beat of the climate change drum and the liberal bent of the potential jury pool. The proponents should be thrilled with her decision.  

 

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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