Association Gives Power Authority
Failing Grade On Tri-Lakes Power Line Proposal
Niskayuna, NY — The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks recently called upon the New York Power Authority (NYPA) to go back to the drawing boards and redraft its environmental assessment of a new power line proposed for the Tri-Lakes Region of Lake Placid, Saranac Lake, Tupper Lake, and surrounding communities.
Instead, NYPA has chosen to push ahead in a rush to gain Adirondack Park Agency (APA) and other permit approvals of a power line route that fails on both energy and environmental planning grounds. “If done correctly, this project could be a model program of sustainable energy delivery and use. However, NYPA is essentially telling us and the APA that they are in too much of a hurry to do the job well,” said Mike DiNunzio, the Association’s Director of Special Projects. The power line project comes before the APA at the agency’s monthly meeting in Ray Brook later this week.
“We are very concerned for the health and safety of Tri-Lakes residents who now must deal with an unreliable electric power supply,” said DiNunzio. “The status quo is unacceptable. Fortunately, providing reliable electricity in the region is entirely compatible with protection of the environment of the Adirondack Park, and the creation of a more sustainable energy future for Adirondack residents and visitors. Unfortunately, NYPA’s preferred alternative and environmental impact statement (EIS) fails on all counts. It seeks a circuitous route that is terribly damaging to the local Adirondack environment, while simultaneously failing to deliver a comprehensive approach to energy production, efficient use, and conservation,“ he said.
When NYPA announced its plans to build the power line last May, it seemed to acknowledge the need for an integrated package of facilities and programs that would improve the reliability of electrical service in the area, while protecting the environment and avoiding the negative side effects the new power could bring. But, according to David Gibson, the Association’s Executive Director, a more comprehensive approach to energy planning and development seems to have been abandoned in the frenzy to build the new line as quickly as possible.
“The State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) requires that major actions like the Tri-Lakes Reliability Project be assessed in their entirety, not in a piecemeal fashion,” Gibson explained. “It appears that NYPA is apparently in too much of a hurry to follow the law and do the job right,” he said. “Nonetheless, I’m confident that the Adirondack Park Agency will do their duty and tell NYPA they must come clean and disclose all the related energy projects they have so far kept under wraps”, he added. “Otherwise, the Agency would help to undermine one of the fundamental provisions of SEQRA.”
Governor Pataki announced a year ago that the power line itself is really only part of the larger Reliability Project, which NYPA has promised will include a proposal to construct a biomass generation facility in Tupper Lake that would burn wood to produce electricity. And the project was advertised by the Governor to include a set of energy conservation and efficiency measures that could prove to be critically important features of a truly sustainable energy system in the Park. But neither of these important projects was included in the proposal now before the Park Agency.
NYPA has admitted in their public comments that the biomass plant in Tupper Lake was part of the project and that a set of 68 energy audits were undertaken to assist in promoting conservation of electricity in the region to be served by the new power line. They said that the biomass facility would be assessed in the next year or so, and that if we wanted to learn more about NYPA’s Tri-Lakes energy efficiency projects, we should contact their Community Affairs Manager. “That’s nice,” says DiNunzio, “but we expect NYPA to honor commitments made in the Governor’s original press release announcing this project – that energy efficiency and conservation must be part of the package.”
“NYPA contends that the route chosen for their new power line would minimize environmental impacts, but this is clearly not so,” said Gibson. “Instead of routing the line down Route 56,” he said, “they prefer to construct a new, permanent 75-foot Right of Way (ROW) through six miles of privately-owned and sensitive boreal forest and wetlands.”
According to Mike DiNunzio, NYPA’s circuitous routing decision was clearly driven by their reluctance to take the time and trouble to seek an amendment to the “Forever Wild” clause of the New York State Constitution that could authorize the line to cross two miles of Forest Preserve along Route 56, a much shorter, less environmentally destructive route along the highway. “We are willing to work with NYPA and the State Legislature to help draft a tightly focused constitutional amendment to permit the line to cross the two miles of Forest Preserve,” he said. “If an amendment is approved in this legislative session, it could be resubmitted
to the new legislature and then to voters in the fall of 2007, well within the time frame NYPA is proposing to plan and build the line.”
“We are very disappointed that NYPA apparently believes the amendment process is too cumbersome and too uncertain for them to bother with. If NYPA truly views the status quo as unacceptable, as we do, they should be speaking with us and members of the State Legislature about a tightly focused constitutional amendment as soon as possible,” says Gibson.
The Association also takes issue with NYPA’s contention that the Tri-Lakes Reliability Project will somehow avoid stimulating significant new growth and a spiraling demand for yet more energy in the years ahead. “We disagree,” Gibson said, “and we find a shocking lack of an analysis to support NYPA’s conclusion.” For example, NYPA admits that the Adirondack Club and Resort project proposed for Tupper Lake would result in more than 700 new residences and about 60 hotel units, along with the reactivation of ski lifts, snow-making equipment, and other energy-hungry amenities that would serve about 50,000 new “visitors” after the first four years of operation. “It’s obvious that the Resort project would not be possible without the new power NYPA plans on providing”, Gibson added. “In addition to the severe electric reliability problem in the Tri-Lakes area, we believe that the proposed Club and Resort may also be a factor in the decision to build the new power line.”
“NYPA and its partners could, and should, do much more to combine the new power line with a comprehensive, innovative set of energy conservation and efficiency programs to advance the ideal of an “energy smart park,” concluded DiNunzio. “By doing so, NYPA would help to promote the greening of the Park’s energy future, not the perpetuation of its environmental, economic, and community problems.”
The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks is a non-profit organization founded in 1901 to employ public education, citizen action, public and private partnerships and strong advocacy to protect, enhance, and sustain the wild character, ecological integrity, and mutual well-being of the natural and human communities of the Adirondack region. The Association's Center for the Forest Preserve in Niskayuna serves as an Adirondack research library and learning center.