Legalectric

The Notice of Comment Period has been issued:

Here’s the plan to review:

2021 Biennial Xmsn Projects Report

Here’s the poop:

How to file comments? See below, and be sure to ask to be on the service list! If you want live links to make it easier, use link to Notice above.

No, wait, that’s not right…

Yeah, that’s it… Midcontinent Independent System Operator, MISO, has released the draft MISO Transmission Expansion Planning report, or MTEP 17.  From the MISO MTEP17 page, here are the live links:

MTEP17 Reports

Full Report
Executive Summary
Book 1 – Transmission Studies
Book 2 – Resource Adequacy
Book 3 – Policy Landscape
Book 4 – Regional Energy Information
Appendix AB
Appendix D1 Central
Appendix D1 East
Appendix D1 South
Appendix D1 West
Appendix D2 Projects In models Documentation
E1 Reliability Planning Methodology
Appendix E2 EGEAS Assumptions
MTEP17 Appendix A1 A2 A3
MTEP17 Appendix F Substantive Comments

Also from MISO’s MTEP page:

Transmission Planning Status Reports

MTEP17 Futures Summary

Generation Retirement Sensitivity Analysis – Scope
Generation Retirement Sensitivity Analysis – Scope Appendix 1

And the most important one that shows what they’re up to in transmission planning, the link, and just in case it disappears, the spreadsheet:

MTEP17 Active Project List 

Copy of MTEP Active Project List

And supposedly they’re taking comments from “stakeholders,” so says the MISO email announcement:

Please send any feedback on this report to David Lucian (dlucian@misoenergy.org) by August 25, 2017.  Stakeholders will have an additional opportunity to provide feedback when the second draft of MTEP17 is posted on September 18, 2017.  A list of report milestones is provided below.

Yes, all this transmission we see, the hard to believe plans of superhighways across the country, MTEP, JCSP, Green Power Express, TrAIL line, Mid-Atlantic Power Pathway, Susquehanna-Roseland, on and on and on, it’s for coal, we know that, but when the truth jumps up and is as in-your-face as it is at this meeting… well, ya gotta read it to believe it.  From the FERC docket entitled PROMOTING REGIONAL TRANSMISSION PLANNING AND EXPANSION TO FACILITATE FUEL DIVERSITY INCLUDING EXPANDED USES OF COAL-FIRED RESOURCES (really, that’s the name…):

FERC Transcript 5/13/05

Here, from p. 61, is a tantalizing snippet from the Pres. of PJM:

PJM is certainly proud of what has been accomplished to date to open up markets to coal, but there is much more that we and others in this region can do to further enhance that use of coal.

It is for this reason that, today, PJM is setting out by example, a new initiative which we have labeled Project Mountaineer — appropriately titled for the state that we’re in — to utilize our regional transmission expansion planning process to explore ways to further develop an efficient transmission super highway, if you will, to deliver the low-cost coal resources in this region of the country, to market.

And to actually build it when people don’t want it over their land, don’t want to look at it, don’t want the EMF impacts?  Well, they say…

About the only answer to that would be some sort of federal siting law that would basically overcome local property rights.

National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors anyone?  This was in 2005… as the CapX Technical Report was about to be published, putting all of this into action… sigh….

To look up the entire docket, go HERE and search for AD05-3, and voila, there it is for your edification and reading enjoyment!

It’s all for coal, we know that, and we’ve got to NOT let them get away with this!

Here we go, the Green Transmission Machine is here and is trying to leave the station, and what a crock.  ITC Holdings, transmission only company a la TRANSLink, has announced “The Green Power Express” and here’s their press release:

ITC Holdings – Green Power Express Press Release

And look at this map, here it is:

Once again, they’re saying “it’s GREEN” from wind in Dakotas to Chicago… oh, but doesn’t it start in ANTELOPE VALLEY?  Isn’t that where all those coal plants are?  Isn’t that where they want to build new coal plants?  And isn’t Illinois the state where they have thousands of MW of wind in the MISO queue?  And for this we should give them $10-12 BILLION to build this?  I don’t think so…

Green Power Express – FERC Rate Filing

And while you’re at it, this is MTEP, so check this out the JCSP/MTEP plan:

JCSP08 Executive Summary

Here’s the upshot of what they’re proposing:

All of this is tied in with the “Upper Midwest Transmission Development Initiative” which is a bunch of utility transmission oriented folks who have a lot to gain from this, Governors lead by Pawlenty the utility toadie, and regulators who don’t seem to be able to think their way out of a box — they’re promoting transmission without addressing need, claiming a transmission solution for a problem that doesn’t exist:

FINAL UMTDI MEETING TOMORROW

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

1:30-3:00 p.m.

PUC Large Hearing Room

3rd Floor

121 – 7th Place East

St. Paul, Minnesota

What dries me crazy is that this so obviously isn’t necessary, because there’s SOOOOO much wind already in Illinois and here’s the MISO queue, in Excel and sortable, for your edification:

MISOqueue608

Here’s an ILL WIND for this project, sorted from above MISO Queue (note that some of that 11,281MW is already in service):

misoqueue-illwind

But this is all about the MISO Midwest Market and displacing natural gas with coal:

ICF Final Deck – PowerPoint

ICF’s Independent Assessment of Midwest ISO Operational Benefits

In Milwaukee Journal Sentinal:

$10 billion transmission lines for wind power

Here’s the STrib article about the Green-with-Nausea Power Express:

Huge power line may be coming to Minnesota

By BOB VON STERNBERG, Star Tribune

February 10, 2009

A massive high-voltage power line that would connect the wind turbine farms along Buffalo Ridge and points west to the Midwest’s biggest cities was unveiled Monday.

ITC Holdings Corp. of Novi, Mich., announced Monday that a 765,000-volt line would run 3,000 miles across seven states, including Minnesota, the Dakotas, Iowa and Wisconsin, carrying power to the Chicago region and points east.

The project, dubbed the “Green Power Express,” would cost as much as $12 billion to transmit as much as 12,000 megawatts of power from windy, sparsely-populated areas.

Company officials touted the project as being line with the goals outlined by President Obama in his national energy agenda, specifically mentioning his desire “to get wind power from North Dakota to population centers, like Chicago.”

Nonetheless, the project is likely to face host of hurdles, starting with its cost and size, given the fact that power lines throughout the Upper Midwest have consistently sparked fierce opposition by local residents.

Further stressing its “green energy” credentials, the company estimated that hooking the wind farms into the region’s electric grid could lead to a reduction of up to 34 million metric tons of carbon emissions, which is equivalent to the annual emissions of as many as nine 600-megawatt coal-fired power plants.

ITC Holdings began the process of winning approval of its plans Monday by filing an application with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. It is likely to also need to pass regulatory hurdles from individual states that the power line would cross.