Editor's note: This story has been updated to remove references to "less costly" routes for the transmission line.
The Trump administration reversed the Obama administration's position on a more than 7-mile-long line of transmission towers running near Historic Jamestowne and Colonial National Historical Park in Virginia on Thursday by approving the project.
The decision came despite alternatives that would have spared the visual blight on Jamestowne, Colonial, Colonial Parkway, and the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail, according to Theresa Pierno, president and CEO of the National Parks Conservation Association.
“It is extremely disappointing that the Army Corps has agreed to let this destructive project move forward. These transmission towers, many the size of the Statue of Liberty, would deface a landscape that has stood for 400 years," she said. “Reasonable alternatives exist to meet the region’s energy needs without sacrificing the integrity of four national park sites in the process.
“There is only one Jamestown, and once development of this magnitude begins, there is no undoing its impacts. We cannot stand by and let that happen. We will continue to fight to protect historic Jamestown and are considering all options, including legal action.”
Dominion Virginia Power maintains that its proposed Surry-Skiffes Creek-Whealton Transmission Line, which would cross the James River between Surry and James City counties with 300-foot-tall towers, is the best way to maintain a healthy power grid in the area. But groups including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, NPCA, and Preservation Virginia maintain there are less-damaging solutions that wouldn't need to span the river and invade the historic setting.
The Interior Department's position on the transmission line project changed when President Trump took office.
Former National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis, who retired at the start of the year, had said in a letter to the Army Corps of Engineers that the project would cause "severe and unacceptable damage to this historically important area and the irreplaceable and iconic resources within it."
"Running power lines through the landscape where the earliest days of American history were written will forever change the ability of Americans to experience and understand our nation's earliest day," the letter also pointed out.
Sally Jewell, President Obama's Interior secretary, in one of her last tasks in that role wrote the Army Corps of Engineers on January 17 to express her concerns over the project.
According to NPCA, the Trump administration granted the permit without first conducting a thorough review of reasonable alternatives that would fulfill the region’s energy needs while protecting historic Jamestown. The Army Corps also failed to conduct a transparent public process and comment period under the National Environmental Policy Act the park advocacy group said.
Central to the issue is the move by Dominion to decomission two coal-fired power plants at Yorktown in Surry County. While the utility sees a future where more power will come from solar and nuclear, until that day, it needs to shore-up its power grid, and the transmission line is key to that move.
The utility is expected to spend nearly $100 million on mitigation projects that will "support, preserve, and/or enhance the historic character or viewshed of the Jamestown Settlement" and provide additional educational and interpretive programs to seawalls to protect Fort Monroe National Monument from sea level rise and efforts to "ensure that human skeletal remains and associated funerary objects encountered ... (are) treated in accordance with the Regulations Governing Permits for the Archaeological Removal of Human Remains."
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Comments
If in fact that is true, why in the world would Dominion Power want to build these towers?
This is how fake news get started. I cant find where NPCA made this claim but expected it from this dishonest organization.
If by "dishonest organization" you mean NPT, I think you are off base. Misguided at times (as in the PEER plastic bottle report) but not dishonest. There are studies that claim the goal can be accomplished cheaper and without the towers. But, it makes no sense to me the Dominion would move forward with a more expensive plan if in fact these alternatives were feasible. Would be interesting to hear where they think the plans come up short.
I meant specifically NPCA as dishonest, the evidence of behavior is from the Drakes Bayes fiasco.
Thanks for the clarification.
"If in fact [less damaging alternatives exist], why in the world would Dominion Power want to build these towers?"
Why indeed? I ask that question all the time about "subsidized" wind and solar. From history, the answer is the self-interest of the suppliers, politicians, and planners. Lots of things in this country don't work as advertised. That never stops the boosters from playing the Wizard of Oz.
Look at any environmental impact statement that presents a list of "alternatives." The bureaucracy always has a preference that subliminally fills the EIS.
Power companies are not interested in history. Nor are they interested in landscape. They're a breed of corporation all their own. Consider TVA, which was only too happy to flood the last free-flowing river in Tennessee to enhance the "efficiency" of the system.
Now they just call it "green," and the public rolls over and plays dead. You want to save Jamestown? How about we save all of it by holding these companies accountable before they build? They have lots worse in the planning stages than Jamestown in the name of "renewable" energy.
You have a point Al, with a guaranteed rate of return, regulated utilities do have an incentive to increase their investment not minimize it.