Townsend: Pulling the Plug on NYRI’s Dark Matters

New York’s latest electrifying controversy finally appears over. Last week the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) denied what was likely the final appeal from New York Regional Interconnect, Inc. (NYRI), the Canadian utility that had planned to build a 191-mile transmission line from Oneida to Orange County in order to deliver electricity more quickly to high-demand communities downstate. FERC had denied NYRI’s appeal to the federal agency to reconsider a March 31 decision preventing it from tapping ratepayer fees for its project.

Without these subsidies the transmission line would have little hope of being financed. I have been an outspoken opponent of NYRI’s nearly 200-mile web of wires, transmission towers, and other eyesores since the utility first decided to darken the skies over towns in Oneida County in 2006. Now that its latest attempt at a comeback has thankfully been turned down, it’s instructive to examine this utility’s sordid history in order to remain resolved that the residents of Central New York will never allow it in our community again.

NYRI has waged an ongoing battle against residents of Oneida County in its quest to run a $1.62 billion power project from our area to New Windsor. Despite public forums and countless newspaper editorials to the contrary, the development company stubbornly considered above-ground transmission lines to be the only option, even calling on private property owners to “sacrifice for the majority, if it’s needed…” There never seemed to be any compelling need to force this project on our families and ratepayers, according to a 2007 study conducted by the New York Independent System Operator (NYISO), a federally regulated agency which oversees the state’s electricity grid.

According to its Comprehensive Reliability Plan, NYISO concluded that there are already enough energy projects in the works to reliably meet New York energy needs until 2016, four years after NYRI said the state’s electricity-transmission congestion would hit critical mass.

As public pressure mounted and funding dried up, NYRI became increasingly demanding of its presumptive ratepayers. For many families in Central New York the utility was asking that the state force us to pay higher electricity rates for a misguided transmission line we rejected from the start. The laws governing NYISO state that for any developers to recover their construction and operating costs through ratepayers would require that 80 percent of weighted votes for the entities selling the electricity support the action. This did not sit well with one of the biggest of those energy companies, Con Edison, who rightly balked at the idea of passing on high costs to new customers.

After New Yorkers said no to NYRI, the company went back to the federal government, declaring our laws and regulators such as the Public Service Commission, the body charged with utilities’ oversight, irrelevant. FERC’s final decision puts the lie to NYRI’s claim that its project was about New Yorkers’ energy needs. It was about making money, plain and simple, and using federal power to undue state protections. The plug has been pulled on NYRI, probably forever, and suddenly the future looks bright again in Central New York.

Townsend: Pulling the Plug on NYRI’s Dark Matters

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