127th Legislature

Energy Utilities Technology Committee

March 8, 2016 work session

Submission by:

Hendrik D. Gideonse,

119 Old County Road,

Brooklin, ME 04616

gideonse@midmaine.com

Chairman Woodsome, Representative Dion and distinguished members of the Joint Standing Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Technology. I am Hendrik Gideonse of Brooklin, ME. I would share additional observations on HD 1513 having studied the video of the March 3 hearing and reviewing now the testimony at the public hearing January 14 as well.

In the memo I prepared for your March 3 work session I raised four sets of questions. What does LD 1513 fix? Who benefits and what are the risks? What’s the current context for generation and transmission potentially bearing on Maine? How does or might this impact Rights Of Way (ROW) needs and issues in Maine, current and prospective, and going beyond electricity per se?

This afternoon I would reference a handful of pertinent frames of reference:

Contextualism, or how policy proposals are embedded in present circumstances;

Long range thinking, or consideration of the requirements and impact of proposals before you well out into the future;

Environmentalism, in particular, intense awareness of how the unanticipated consequences of past energy practice now require a dramatic shift to new forms and proportions of energy;

Loving wild and natural Maine and acute awareness of its central role in our economy; and

The unfortunate shift of governmental power away from democracies and toward huge, multi- national corporations and immense concentrations of private wealth.

Given all that, how might such frames affect your deliberations?

First, the bulk of the input to you has been from the corporate sector. Why hasn’t there been more “we the people” input and, since there hasn’t, to what extent does that make your role in that regard now primary?

The word “stakeholders” or “interests” has been used frequently, but almost exclusively in the context of fair competition among generation and T&D companies. Again, where are “we the people”? Where are the farmers or orchardists who have invested decades of their lives in their trees and soils, where are they as “stakeholders” when a right of way across their hard-won and largely personally-built creations become targets of opportunity by a transnational corporation? And how can we assure Maine ratepayers don’t pay added infrastructure costs required for power use outside our state?

Third, committee members asked process questions. I’d suggest structural ones, too. Besides EUT, what orientations might ENR or Judiciary or ACF contribute to examination of the questions impacting Maine by a legislative proposal like the one before you?

Last week I mentioned how my participation in the issues raised by the proposed E/W Corridor had shaped my views. Once ROW’s are approved how is Maine, its communities, its residents, its aquifers, natural resources, wildlife, etc. to be protected against might be called “utilities mission creep” as those ROW’s become of interest, for example, for pipeline transport of oil, natural gas, and water and the movement of goods via motorized vehicles? How should existing rights of way (notably, for example, respecting the validity of the “up to capacity” assessment of the Orrington sub-station) be capitalized on instead of accepting the idea of T&D operations looking for new ROW?

One of the power company reps made the statement he knew of no projects, and was unaware of any others. I have to ask doesn’t he read the papers? It’s been all over the press the past few weeks. Furthermore, I’d observe that in politics and executive function the notion of plausible deniability can be protected by clever organizational structural insulation. Therefore, I’d urge you move on any such proposal such as this with great caution . . . unless, of course, you see fit to reject it altogether and perhaps even make explicit the generation/T&D bifurcation implicit since the late 90's. Personally, I think you should do both. Further, I believe your committee should undertake a thorough exploration of the comprehensive picture for Maine of relevant generation and T&D sources and layouts. What are the demands for them within and or related to Maine, associated service costs and requirements and their fair allocation to actual users and benefitting populations (as compared to ourselves as Mainers where the energy is produced or through whose territory it passes)? Project that picture as best you can out into the future. Then, when you are asked to consider proposed changes in statute, you will have that larger view and its evolution firmly and functionally in mind.

I was impressed with the Committee’s intensity and focus in the two sessions I watched. What I have offered to you is a change in the orientation of your work to study rather than action in order better to serve a substantially larger conceptualization of the stakeholders in play, not just “stakeholders” and “interests,” Mr. Chairman, but the people, now and out into the future, to assure your work truly serves us all.