Opposition to TVA Power Line

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TVA releases final EA (FONSI) and begins construction immediately. TVA released its "Finding of No Significant Impact study," on May 8th and began construction on the transmission line early on May 9th. It appears that they want to complete the new transmission line before our citizens' group can file an injunction. According to group members, they have numerous construction crews operating simultaneously on different sections of the route and plan to finish the transmission line before we can obtain an injunction. If this is the case, it is the second time we have seen a power company use rate payer money to subvert democratic processes that would protect private landowners. The final report addresses almost none of the concerns that our representatives submitted except for an old historic wagon road. Documentation in the FONSI indicates the historic road issue was addressed when the Tennessee Historical Commission found out about the road and withdrew the permit for construction until TVA altered the route.

We have learned that TVA has approved a plan to upgrade the Cookeville South substation proposed by the City of Cookeville. This plan would alleviate the excessive load on the TVA West Cookeville substation (the major reason for building the new Algood transmission line). The city will start construction as soon as the annexation issues between Cookeville Electric and UCEMC are resolved (probably by the end of May).

A recent article in the Herald Citizen by Liz Engel discusses TVA plans to consider rerouting part of the proposed transmission in response to concerns from the State historical commission about the impact of the proposed transmission line on an old horse and carriage road. This road was described in our original report submitted prior to route selection and appeared to be deliberately ignored by TVA. Members of our group brought this road to the attention of TVA again in public comments on the draft EA, meetings with TVA officers, and the Tennessee historical commission.

Rural electric cooperatives tried to get the State legislature to approve a bill that would give them the freedom to provide cable television and internet. That bill was defeated when lobbyist for the cooperatives refused to accept an amendment that would require them to have open meetings and open records. This is the second effort by rural electric cooperatives to keep their meetings and records secret from the public. Some of us are wondering what they are trying to hide.

Friends and members of our group worked with State legislators to support a bill that would require rural electric cooperatives to have open meetings and open records. The rural electric cooperatives (who enjoy a monopoly for distribution of electric power in their territories) used rate payer money to lobby against the bill and defeat public scrutiny of their operations. Separately, another bill moved through committees that would require rural electric cooperatives to develop policies that would allow citizens to meet with the rural electric cooperative boards and voice their concerns. Subsequent to that bill being approved by several legislative committees, one of our own members, Barry Stein, was invited to a UCEMC board meeting to express the group's concerns. We had requested a public meeting with all interested group members, but UCEMC limited the group to one spokesperson. He was given 15 minutes to state concerns and was informed that the board would respond in writing at a later date. Stein noted that the community group had been repeatedly denied access to information that would allow members to determine if there was a real need for the proposed transmission line project and whether the proposed transmission was the best solution to the underlying problem. He recommended that the board approve policies that would create open meetings and open records for projects that resulted in the use of eminent domain to confiscate landowner's property. He also suggested that it would be good to extend those policies to other areas of business as well since UCEMC enjoyed a monopoly status within its territory and is not regulated by any body other than its board of directors. Stein also reiterated the groups request for specific documents related to the proposed project (see text). We are waiting for the UCEMC response.

We would like to thank everyone who submitted comments on the TVA draft EA. These comments clearly indicate that this project is unnecessary and grossly underestimates the environmental impact. We have posted a few of the comments below.

Buck Mountain Community Organization Comments (Gary Davis & Assoc., Lanzalotta & Assoc.)

Member of Buck Mountain Community Organization

An article by Liz Engel in the Herald-Citizen describes the events surrounding the proposed transmission line on Buck Mountain as a top story in 2007.

TVA has again denied our appeal to obtain all documents related to the need for the proposed transmission line under the freedom of information act. This is the third time we have tried to obtain the documents that would justify the need for this project and that would allow our independent expert to determine if the transmission line is really needed. Over 171 pages of material are being withheld and some of that material is essential to the justification of need. If there truly is a need for this project, why are TVA and UCEMC withholding this information from us?

TVA has extended the deadline for comments on the Draft Environmental Assessment to January 15, 2008. We strongly encourage everyone to submit comments in opposition to the proposed transmission line before the deadline. Your comments will help establish the controversial nature of this project. Some of our preliminary thoughts on the draft are posted on this link. Essentially, there are real questions about the need for this transmission line and we request a full (NEPA) environmental impact study be conducted before proceeding. Send your comments to:

James F. Williamson, Jr.
Tennessee Valley Authority
400 West Summit Hill Drive
Knoxville, Tennessee 37902
jfwilliamson@tva.gov
Phone: 865-632-6418
Fax: 865-632-3451

TVA has released the Draft Environmental Assessment for the Algood transmission line. All comments on the draft must be received by December 31, 2007. The draft report identifies a number of potentially significant issues, ignores others, and tries to downplay the environmental impact. At one point, It actually says that cutting the right away will be good for the environment. We encourage everyone to comment on the inadequacies of this report and demand that TVA conduct a full NEPA environmental impact study that is more thorough than this cursory environmental assessment. The justification for this transmission is still based on an erroneous projection of an 8 megawatt increase in peak power demand that is based on an exaggerated projection of 3 new large industries coming to Algood - something that never happened. Send comments to us and Jim Willamson, Senior NEPA Specialist, 400 W. Summit Hill Drive (WT 11D), Knoxville, TN 37916-1499.

UCEMC and TVA have refused to give us access to documents and information that would justify the need for the this transmission line. The Herald Citizen has a story on this denial of our request for information as well as an analysis of the environmental impact of cutting over 32 acres of trees along the right-of-way. According to USDA forest publications the environmental damage will exceed $2 billion.

In an interview with the Herald Citizen's Liz Engel, TVA essentially admitted there are no new known industries coming to Algood. When asked to identify the sources of the projected 8 megawatt increase in peak demand for the Algood substation, TVA's Allen Miller could not identify any new industries coming to the Algood area. He said there was speculation about some possible new retail stores and a school. Algood City Manager, Freddie Maxwell, also said he had no knowledge of any new industries coming into the area. In any event, the most optimistic speculation about possible new businesses do not justify a projected 8 megawatt increase in peak demand for the Algood substation. In fact, with the loss of customers to Cookeville Electric (see below) there may be no increase in peak demand, or even a decrease in demand. Future annexations of customers by Cookeville Electric that are part of the State approved Cookeville Urban Expansion Growth Boundary will involve the additional loss of customers at the UCEMC Algood substation.

Three representatives of our group presented arguments against this proposed transmission line to the TVA board & CEO at the August public board meeting. TVA has since updated their website to provide additional information about the need for this transmission line. The justification identifies three new unidentified industries and a 400 unit apartment complex that are supposedly being built in the Algood area. It is interesting that no one at the local chamber of commerce or in the building industry that we have spoken with seems to know anything about these projects. Furthermore, there is still no mention of the loss of 1200 UCEMC customers to Cookeville Electric that would actually reduce power demand at the substation served by this new transmission line. We find it strains credibility to claim that the Algood substation will experience a 30% increase in peak demand over the next three years when Cookeville and the rest of Tennessee are only experiencing about a 2% annual increase in electric demand and the national average is about 1.6%.

Gary Davis & Associates have been retained as legal council to fight the proposed TVA transmission line. We need your contributions to support this legal effort (see bottom of page for who to contact about contributing). We thank all those who have already contributed to this effort.

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TVA's new strategic plan emphasizes many of the things we have been pushing for to eliminate the need for this new transmission line (related article, related article). We hope they are not just paying lip service to environmental concerns and that their actions will reflect these policies (see examples below).

Partner with distributors and directly served customers to encourage conservation, promote energy efficiency, and reduce peak demand
In partnership with others, TVA will strive to be a leader in energy-efficiency improvements and peak demand reduction over the next five years. Improving energy efficiency and reducing peak demand are significant actions that help slow demand growth in a cost-effective manner while addressing air pollution and global climate change.

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A recent article in the Herald Citizen discusses the recently decided lawsuit between the City of Cookeville and UCEMC related to the annexation of about 1200 residents in the UCEMC service area. It appears that Cookeville will be providing electric power to residents in the annexed Algood area sometime in the next few years. Cookeville's urban growth plan also involves annexing additional customers served by UCEMC in Putnam County. It is interesting that the significant loss of customers through annexation to Cookeville Electric is not mentioned in the planning report we received from TVA and that was used to justify the need for a new substation and transmission line for UCEMC in Algood (we have again been denied access to certain portions of that report). How significant is this loss of customers? The article notes that UCEMC believes the "large annexations by the City of Cookeville in recent years
have been a cause for concern in continuing to provide electric service at a reasonable rate and maintain debt obligations to the federal government." This sounds like a pretty significant reduction in customers and related power supply needs for UCEMC in the Algood area. We believe that the power needs in the Algood area need to be re-examined in the light of these annexation plans before UCEMC and TVA incur even more debt that may be unnecessary.

It is also interesting (same article) that UCEMC's largest number of customers are in Putnam County. Surprisingly, only 2 of the 10 board members are elected by Putnam County residents.

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TVA announced the preferred route on April 18, 2007 - it is the route across Buck Mountain. The route was adjusted slightly from the original proposal and can be seen on this link. The rationale for selecting this route is (to put it mildly) dumbfounding. You can read it for yourself on this link. In their decision, TVA notes that the Buck Mountain Route is the preferred route because there is little environmental impact.

Reading the details (see Table 1 in the document) provides a slightly different perspective. The route across Buck Mountain will

Destroy 32 acres of forest (literally thousands of trees) and twice that of other routes along a ROW of 63 acres. In other words, half of the route is through forests. These are some of the largest remaining contiguous forests around Cookeville and Algood.
1/3 of the route involves slopes of 20% or 30% (it goes up and then down a mountain). Erosion and subsequent degradation of streams and underground aquifers should be expected when construction begins.

We have finally been able to obtain portions of the planning report that UCEMC claims justifies the need for this new transmission line under a Freedom of Information Request to TVA (UCEMC publicly denied our request and never responded to any of our formal requests for the report). We received this report only after the comment period had ended. That report can be found on this link. Two things are clear from reading the documents that were provided. First, no attempt was made to include conservation activities or distributed power generation into the projections for electricity demand. Second, the future estimates for electric power consumption seem wildly exaggerated and are totally unsubstantiated in the documents we were given.

Many people have asked why the existing transmission line to the Algood substation can not be upgraded if it is really needed and prevent all of this environmental destruction. In fact, this was the plan that was presented to the Algood Planning Commission when the substation project was submitted for approval. Cookeville officials have advised us that they could supply power to the Algood Substation while the existing line is upgraded if TVA constructed a short connecting line (see map).

We have constructed an overlay of a portion of the proposed route on a topo map with some of the known caves that are in close proximity to the proposed route. The map is approximate since the TVA route map was difficult to scale. The caves may be closer than depicted.

We are currently raising funds for a legal challenge. Please contact Paul Isbell (see below) to make donations to the the Buck Mountain Legal Defense Fund.

Also, please contact our representatives in Congress to protest the planned transmission line.

The Buck Mountain Community Organization was formed to fight the location of the power line on Buck Mountain and through the Rockwell Hollow (Hidden Hollow Area) and to explore alternatives to building costly transmission lines and new power plants that adversely affect the environment and land owners' property values.

This website provides information about the impact of these power lines on the environment, historical sites, property values, and who you should contact to stop this project. We identify a number of important issues that should help any reasonable person understand why these power lines should not be built. We need your help now for our costly legal defense of this beautiful natural area.