Legalectric

You may remember reading about this on the Bly Blog, and here it is again, Electricity: Winners and Losers, but this time the gathering was in Lindstrom, Minnesota.

Jamie Anderson, our hostess with the mostess, runs Many Voices Bookseller and Coffeeshop, and it’s “info central” in the area, hosting events like this, the Wild River Audubon Society, and trying to fill those needs in a small rural/exurban community, well, you have to be out here to understand…

We were there to see Green Green Water and talk about energy. Now’s the time to check it out, right HERE! It’s the story of the impacts of our energy choices, and an urgent call to take responsibility for electrical generation — we can do it differently.

This “Electricity: Winners and Losers” was put together by Just Energy and was sponsored by Women’s Environmental Institute, Many Voices Bookseller and Coffeehouse, and Minnesotans for an Energy-Efficient Economy, and Ken Bradley of Just Energy at ME3 presented their film clip of Green Green River.

Also present were Women’s Environmental Institute staff members Rep. Karen Clark and Jacqueline Zita, and a room full of area folks, real people who are affected by the changes this legislative session.

Yes, I went there on a mission — first, to make sure everyone in that room knew there was no electricity crisis. For that, just look at the CapX2020 report (the 6,000MW claimed need in the chart on p. 5, and the 16,712MW in line for generation interconnection shown on p. 7, do the math, we’re fine). The more complicated part was about the Chisago line, which is going to go right through downtown Lindstrom. Years back, the locals had tanked the NSP Chisago Transmission Line by showing that it wasn’t needed to serve Minnesota load, that was back in the days where it was “Minnesota” need that mattered. Now, as of the last legislative session’s Transmission Omnibus Bill from Hell, it’s REGIONAL need, and it’s going to be pert near impossible to disprove that need, it’s just too broad. Shellene Johnson, President of Concerned River Valley Citizens, did a great briefing of the status of the project and some of the problems she anticipates, and she knows that the changes this session will hurt her community, those living under the line.

All of you at home, get out your pens and Thank You Notes — We have Bill Grant of the Izaak Walton League, Midwest Office, and George Crocker of North American Water Office to thank for their work as the primary ones who trotted this “good deal” around and sold it to legislators. That’s what made this change happen.

Everyone in that room in Many Voices in Lindstrom needed to know that Xcel regularly promises to submit its application, and has already obtained approval from the PUC of its Notice Plan. This legislative change will have an impact on them all personally. So, get ready, roll up your sleeves — we’ll have a lot of work to do.

Here are the specific legislative additions that make “regional” need the criteria — from the Transmission Omnibus Bill from Hell SF1368:

6.35 or, in the case of a high-voltage transmission line, the
6.36 relationship of the proposed line to regional energy needs, as
7.1 presented in the transmission plan submitted under section
7.2 216B.2425;

and

7.19 (9) with respect to a high-voltage transmission line, the
7.20 benefits of enhanced regional reliability, access, or
7.21 deliverability to the extent these factors improve the
7.22 robustness of the transmission system or lower costs for
7.23 electric consumers in Minnesota;

and

12.28 Subdivision 1. [TARIFF ESTABLISHMENT.] A tariff shall be
12.29 established to optimize local, regional, and state benefits from
12.30 wind energy development, and to facilitate widespread
12.31 development of community-based wind energy projects throughout
12.32 Minnesota.

Regional need. Great. Thanks George… Thanks Bill…