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stop this freakin huge powerline!
Listening to: rain Reading: Empire, OS Card Weather: 65, rainy Allegheny Power plans to run a massive 240 mile 500 kilovolt power line through northern West Virginia, Washington and Greene Counties in Pennsylvania, and northern Virginia. It's called the Transallegheny Interstate Line (TrAIL). The transmission towers could be up to 160 feet tall and the rights of way could be 200 feet wide. The lines will be engineered to be capable of carrying twice the power of a normal 500kv line. The purpose is to increase the availability of electricity for the power-hungry mid-Atlantic areas where Allegheny can make lots of money selling it. Look at the route, clearly jogging over across West Virginia is not the straightest route, it's the route that's CHEAPEST and likely to have LEAST RESISTANCE because we're poor rural people. It's not right, and I'm going to bust my ass to stop this thing.
Why it sucks and must be prevented:
- they'll use all kinds of nasty herbicides all along this powerline, these are already proven to be bad for our health
- it will be hideous and ruin our beautiful vistas, and natural beauty is why many of us choose to live here
- it will dramatically reduce our property values, and this house is my only financial asset (I don't even have retirement, for real)
- though causation is still scientifically unclear, people close to high-voltage powerlines have increased incidence of serious health problems, I don't want to be the guinea pig that proves them
this thing will not benefit us economically, it will not create any economic opportunity, to the contrary it will have long-term negative economic consequences as our tax revenues will go down with property values, and Allegheny's costs in building it will be passed on to US, their customers
who benefits from it? 1. Allegheny is shitting dollar signs on this one, 2. the powersucking urban and suburban 95 corridor dwellers. They can continue to piggishly consume all the power, while we decimate our streams mining the coal, poison our lungs burning it, and waste away our property values and natural assets to feed the pig.
Here are a bunch of websites to learn more about the issue:
- Laurel Run Watershed Association's website
http://www.laurelrunwatershed.org/pb/wp_3f964522/wp_3f964522.html?0.017357606650733604- Capon Valley Coalition's website
http://www.caponvalleycoalition.com/- Piedmont Environmental Council's website
http://www.pecva.org/landuse/energy/powerlines/links.php- A Western Pennsylvania citizens group website opposing the project http://stopaptrail.org/
- A Pennsylvania Congressman's website opposing the National Interest Energy Transmission Corridors designation that shifts more control to the federal government to use imminent domain powers for energy projects like this one
http://www.house.gov/list/press/pa12_murtha/pr050507nietc.html- Allegheny's website about the powerline
http://www.aptrailinfo.com/index.php?page=wv-proposed-route-map- An article from April 2 in a trade publication about the project
http://tdworld.com/overhead_transmission/allegheny-seeks-authorization-for-transmission-line/- The WV Highlands Conservancy blog post from April 8
http://wvhighlands.org/wv_voice/?p=198- A research group article from 1998 about risks and benefits of electric transmission projects in WV
http://www.nrcce.wvu.edu/special/electricity/elecpaper5.htm- The WV Public Service Commission's request for proposals for analysis of this project
http://tinyurl.com/3xq2ysWhat now? I'm continuing to learn about this thing and find ways I can take action to stop it. I'm going to a meeting tonight at South Middle School that will include the Consumer guy from the WV Public Service Commission. I will continue to post more to this blog as I know more.
We need some good leadership. I think the Pennsylvania citizen groups are way ahead of us in organizing effective opposition, I'm ready to learn from them and engage some experts with experience in organizing to put the brakes on this shit.
permalink posted by cat 7:05 AM