Glenn English, CEO of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, suggested Tuesday that there might be "the basis for a deal" with environmental interests on transmission-line siting, though it was not quite clear just what the elements would be. Still, it almost refreshing to have the transmission issue come up in discussion of climate-energy legislation. It hasn't gotten much play over the last few months, though it remains one of the nightmares lurking in the closet.
At a CQ-Roll Call Group event in Washington, our colleague Cathy Cash reports, English identified what is unarguably "not a scientific problem" but "a political problem. ... Are we going to have renewable energy play a major role? If so, then we're going to have to have the political will and stomach to vote the authority to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to accomplish this objective."
If the mishmash of issues at play in the climate change legislation can be settled out enough to get a package ready for a full Senate vote, there will still be the energy issues: renewables and efficiency mandates, transmission planning/siting (and maybe cost allocation) and more.
English's rural electric co-ops want FERC to get authority to site extra-high-voltage lines. These lines should be cost-shared across an entire interconnection; anyone should be able to take an ownership share; and rate incentives for builders of these lines should be limited, NRECA says. This is all provided that new lines are arrived at through inclusive planning processes.
The inclusive planning process seems to have a lot of support; the Department of Energy is now studying applications for grants to groups that will do that work. The awards should be coming soon.
But the part about cost allocation across the interconnection? There are already battles over that, over the principle that beneficiaries should pay -- and the question of identifying, quantifying benefits is one that triggers fundamental issues for some. And giving FERC the siting authority? Shall localities simply knuckle under? Shall state officials relinquish their authority? These are very big, very intrusive structures, not like gas pipelines that go through siting controversies but are then buried out of sight.
English was talking at the CQ-Roll Call event with Dan Lashof of the Natural Resources Defense Council, which "totally" agrees about the need to build out a transmission system to enable big deployment of renewables. But if the big new transmission is "used to run existing dirty coal power plants," Lashof said, "that is where our resistance comes from."
If the transmission buildout measures were linked to "a real commitment to cleaning up the grid," he said, the resistance could diminish. It was then that English said, "Sounds like the basis for a deal."
If environmentalists' opposition were the only factor, it's possible something could be worked out. But it isn't. And then there are the other climate bill issues, like carbon allowance allocations.
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