Dave Hallquist, CEO of Vermont Electric Coop, listens to a member comment about the proposed transmissions upgrade. VTD/Taylor Dobbs
JOHNSON–The Vermont Electric Co-op members overwhelmingly approved a 16.9-mile transmission line upgrade on Tuesday night.
Though opponents of the Kingdom Community Wind project had lobbied members to block the special ballot, the results were far from close – the vote was 5,340 to 1,379.
The support at the ballot box bolsters CEO David Hallquist’s assertion that most members believe wind power should be part of the mix. “As of last year, 71% of our members support wind,” Hallquist said.
Activists led by Energize Vermont, a lobbying group, had hoped to prevail and in so doing delay Green Mountain Power’s plans to begin construction of the 21-turbine wind farm on Lowell Mountain on Aug. 1. The project schedule is tight. Construction must be completed bu Dec. 31, 2012 or else the utility risks losing $40 million in tax credits for the $150 million project.
Co-op officials also pressed members for support of the project in emails, face-to-face meetings and recorded phone messages.
The co-op member referendum on the transmission line upgrade from Lowell to the town of Jay will pave the way for the co-op to receive $7 million from Green Mountain Power for the $12 million project.
The vote was announced shortly after 7 p.m. outside the Vermont Electric Co-op offices after an almost hour-long question-and-answer session with Co-op CEO David Hallquist. Members who were part of the vocal opposition grilled him on the finer points of the upgrade.
More than 100 members filed into the VEC warehouse in Johnson to deliver ballots and hear the verdict. Members from all over the state voiced their concerns about the project’s relationship to Green Mountain Power’s wind project, which came under fire last week after contractors and landowners began illegal pre-construction activities.
“I don’t know if we want to be in bed with these people,” said John Fox of Woodbury.
Hallquist, who answered questions from members, appeared flustered at times as he defended the proposed upgrades. One member heckled Hallquist about his “nice suit” as the CEO tried to keep control of the meeting before the vote was announced.
“We’re focused on rates,” he said, “keeping the rates down.”
Scores of VEC members came to Tuesday's meeting to hear and voice opinions about the proposed transmission upgrade. VTD/Taylor Dobbs
Members chided co-op leaders for not offering a survey or other forum for members near the project to voice their opinions sooner.
“People needed to have a voice earlier,” said Carol Maroney of Craftsbury, “and they didn’t.”
Later in the meeting, Hallquist acknowledged that “This is the real first message that we’re getting from our members on this.”
Peggie Sapphire of Craftsbury grilled officials. “I’d like to ask you whether you have calculated the uncalculatable cost of the environmental damage that is going to be wreaked on Lowell Mountain,” Sapphire said.
Hallquist shifted blame toward the state when members questioned the ecological impact of the Green Mountain Power wind project. “That’s the Public Service Board’s job,” he said when pressed about whether or not co-op officials considered the “uncalculatable (sic.)” environmental cost to Lowell Mountain.
Permalink |
This is a good time to pause and offer kudos to all involved — David Hallquist and his fellow leaders of the VEC for engaging with the co-op’s members on these pressing public policy issues, and VEC members for their interest and activism.
Some realities are so obvious they can, regrettably, go unexamined. The customers of CVPS and GMP don’t have the opportunity to debate and then to vote on capital projects their utility undertakes. Thus, they have no say about what public policy their energy dollars are used to advance. While the Public Service Board regulates all utilities, and thus points even the investor-owned ones in certain directions, this is far less effective and, frankly, far less satisfying, than the opportunity to use the democratic process to guide one’s utility.
The development of the nation’s network of electric cooperatives — which brought electricity to millions of people that investor-owned utilities snubbed and left impoverished — is one of the signal achievements of the 20th Century. That the institutions created to effectuate those achievements are democratically controlled and community owned is, in itself, a great legacy. Today that legacy plays out to great effect in Vermont; witness the democracy-induced transition of the Washington Electric Cooperative from a utility deeply committed to nuclear power to a utility deeply committed to renewable energy.
Now the Vermont Electric Cooperative is deeply committed to wind energy. This will displease an important segment of the community — Energize Vermont and other industrial wind skeptics — and the views of these folks continue to deserve serious consideration. But the reality they must confront is that their views are distinctly in the minority among VEC members. That the democratic process is ultimately what is resolving the issue is worthy of celebration of all who participated in it. As a customer of an investor-owned utility, I can only look on with admiration and respect.
Permalink |
Thank you, Don.
I am very pleased with the level of member involvement and their commmitment to the democratic process. I want to reach out to those 1379 members who voted no to the transmission upgrade and recognize their concerns regarding industrial wind projects. Although the vote did not go the way they wanted it to, their voices are just as important.
I do think we can develop an end vision for this country for energy that is based on solar and storage. I come from the computer business where we had to drive our efficiencies to enable smaller and smaller computers. Think about if we can apply that same intesity of technology development to solar and storage. If we could reach 98% conversion efficiency is solar cells along with 98% round trip efficiencies in storage, I suspect we would all be better off. However, it is going to take an incredible collective push to get there.
Permalink |
Or, another way of looking at it, is that if you have enough money you can buy a vote in Vermont.
Most Vermonters have not taken the time to learn what is involved in constructing big wind turbines on Vermont’s mountains.
Here’s a 3 minute and 50 second video that is a compilation of photos of the Sheffield First Wind construction site, in chronological order beginning Sept. 2010 through July 23, 2011. http://vimeo.com/26965317
Vermont’s DEC says the site is a model of how to do things right. What do you think?