|
Experts: NYC may be nearing electricity crisis: NYRI officials say whole state will suffer if new line not built
By Devlin Barrett - The Associated Press, March 5, 2007
WASHINGTON -- Amid the crescendo of upstate opposition to a proposed high-voltage power line is a buzzing, crackling problem: Scientists fear New York City's energy demands will outstrip its supply in just a matter of years.
Officials with New York Regional Interconnect Inc. were in Washington last week seeking to win support for their proposed transmission line running some 200 miles south from Utica to the lower Hudson Valley.
So far, the project has generated massive resistance among upstate communities. It has also been met with skepticism from politicians, except in New York City, where officials worry about the possibility of future blackouts if the peak-demand days of summer overwhelm the downstate power grid.
On hot summer days, New York City consumes more power than the entire nation of Chile and only a bit less than Switzerland -- and its demands keep growing.
NYRI project manager Bill May said last week that New Yorkers across the state should realize a basic fact: New York City needs more, cheaper, electricity, and without it the entire state will suffer.
"New York City is the growth engine for New York state and has been for many years," May said during a trip to Washington to lobby federal officials for the line as part of what he said is a national need for improved transmission systems.
Upstate officials bristle at the suggestion that doing what's best for the city will ultimately be best for them.
"I take serious offense to what NYRI is trying to do," said Rep. Michael Arcuri, D-Utica. "NYRI is trying to pit upstate against downstate, and I refuse to be a part of that. We are good neighbors, and this is not about pitting upstate against downstate."
NYRI argues its line is not the monstrosity envisioned by upstate residents. NYRI says its towers will be much shorter than a similar line built years ago, and it will be built largely along old stretches of railroad to cause minimal disruption.
That's still way too close for Arcuri, whose own home is just 300 to 400 feet from the proposed line.
"They are trying to knife a scar right down the middle of the state, and just run roughshod over property owners," Arcuri said.
May counters that if upstate residents are worried about their property values, it only makes sense to build the power line as a boost to the economy. Jobs, May argued, are the best way to increase property values.
Gov. Eliot Spitzer said last week that NYRI should reconsider what it's trying to accomplish.
"Frankly, at a certain level when you have such universal local opposition, you've got to step back and say there's a better way to do this," Spitzer said.
The governor readily concedes that after years of little or no activity on the energy front, New York needs to cut through the bureaucratic inertia that has plagued energy production and transmission in the state.
"Something we desperately need is getting more generating capacity online," he said. "Let's get more wind, solar, ethanol and also traditional natural gas and clean coal so we're moving on many energy fronts. But that doesn't mean that every project that comes along is good merely because it will add power to the system."
Spitzer suggested the solution may be to run transmission lines along the New York State Thruway or other state-owned roads, but that poses a different set of regulatory and logistical hurdles.
Last summer, shortly before a prolonged blackout in a section of New York City infuriated many affected residents, a report from a National Academy of Sciences committee warned about the looming energy problems on New York's horizon, and suggested the resistance to additional power plants may force a crisis.
|
