And in what could be the first official challenge to back-stop transmission authority given FERC, as prescribed by such EPAct 2005 mandate, has been pre-filed for consultation with FERC. A Southern California Edison (SCE) application to the Arizona Corporation Commission, (ACC) the public utility commission of Arizona, was rejected in May 2007 by ACC.
SCE merely wanted to run a 230-mile transmission line from Arizona to California at a cost of $242 million to Arizona ratepayers. And the benefit to Arizona? None, as it would specifically be to serve Californians and their growing energy needs.
The ACC described SCE’s project as “a 230-mile extension cord” into Arizona’s generation supply. And likewise in his letter to Secretary Bodman in November 2007, after the NIETC was finalized, Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell wrote, “These transmission lines will be on our land and depreciate our property values, but they may not offer any benefit to Pennsylvania consumers. This designation and action by the federal government is a blatant abuse of states’ rights,” Governor Rendell said.
Yet, this is likely just the beginning, exemplifying a dysfunctional remedy, to “fix” the U.S. power grid and growing domestic energy needs, by way of EPAct 2005. It will essentially be a power grab for power both literally and figuratively, the sights of which the U.S. has never seen.
Part III of Fallout from the Energy Policy Act of 2005, will take a look at: the various federal and state laws which the NIETC either directly or potentially violate or conflict with; proposed or pending pieces of legislation in Congress in order to amend specific sections of EPAct 2005; and the mechanisms that the DOE and FERC either already have or expect to have in place in the future in order to maintain effective oversight of such a massive body of law and its unprecedented changes in U.S. energy policy.
Copyright ©2008 Diane M. Grassi
Contact: dgrassi@cox.net
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