Utilities ask for approval process to be postponed

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By Garren Shipley -- gshipley@nvdaily.com

WINCHESTER -- A procedural delay in Maryland has two utilities seeking to build a new high-voltage transmission line across Frederick County asking for a postponement in Virginia's approval process.

Allegheny Energy and American Electric Power asked the Virginia State Corporation Commission on Friday to push back hearings on the Potomac-Appalachian Transmission Highline project from January until August.

Maryland regulators turned down the application in early September, finding that the subsidiary formed by the two firms to build the line was not an "ele-ctric company" under Maryland's legal definition of the term.

Only utilities can be granted permission to build transmission lines in that state, according to the Maryland Public Service Commission's order.

That prompted the SCC staffers charged with determining whether or not the project was needed to move for dismissal.

Without a set endpoint in Maryland, there's no way to analyze how the line would impact the grid or if it's even needed at all, staffers wrote in court filings.

Allegheny responded that it has no plans to move the endpoint of the line. Ending at Kemptown, Md., is the whole purpose of building the line in the first place, the utility wrote.

Regulators would be doing a major disservice to the local grid by dismissing the application based on Maryland's action, according to Allegheny.

But the Old Line State's delay has thrown a wrench into the works, and applications in both Virginia and West Virginia would now work better using data about the electrical grid and the need for the line compiled for a new proceeding in Maryland, according to lawyers for the utilities.

The companies "believe it would be administratively efficient to use the same [regional grid operator's] analyses to support such need in each of the three proceedings," they wrote.

As drawn, the $1.8 billion, 765-kilovolt line would stretch from St. Albans, W.Va., to Kemptown, via northern Frederick County.

Supporters say the line will bring vital fault tolerance to the region's growing electrical grid, while detractors say the line is unneeded and will only allow the two companies to sell more electricity from coal-fired power plants in places like western Pennsylvania.

Allegheny has yet to reach a decision about how to proceed in Maryland, but the company said in court filings Friday that it would likely made a decision in six weeks or less.

If the commission does push back the proceedings as requested, a final decision on the line could be handed down in February 2011. Hearings on the line were set to begin in Richmond next month.