Deficiencies found in power line application

Agency says negotiated stipulations are not addressed

By FRITZ MAYER

ALBANY, NY — The agency that will decide whether the controversial power line project can move forward through the state has decided that the application for the project is still incomplete.

Jaclyn Brilling, secretary of the Public Service Commission (PSC), sent a letter to New York Regional Interconnect (NYRI) on March 24, saying the company’s supplemental application, which was filed on February 22, is not complete and will need to be amended once again before the process can move forward. The initial application, filed in May 2006, was originally deemed incomplete in June 2006.

One of the items missing from the supplemental application, according to the letter, is a “list of all local ordinances, laws, resolutions, regulations, standards, and other requirements applicable to the proposed facility, together with a statement that the location of the facility as proposed conforms to all such local legal provisions…”

The letter also indicates that a number of aerial photographs need to be added to the application, that legible architectural drawings for parts of the facility need to be included and that the visual impacts of the line need further clarification.

Brilling also said the NYRI had not adequately addressed all of the elements of stipulations it agreed to in November 2006, when negotiating with four groups that opposed the power line project. Among the stipulations was one in which NYRI agreed to identify “historic structures and historic landscapes as listed or eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places along the proposed route.”

The letter also informed NYRI that it must include a 2006 study by New York Independent System Operator, the non-profit organization that manages New York State’s power grid, which concluded that the proposed power line was not necessary until at least 2016.

With the application deemed incomplete by the PSC, the clock has not yet started on the one-year time period in which the PSC has to either approve or disapprove the NYRI project before the company may become eligible to sidestep the PSC and seek the permits necessary to build the facility through the federal government.

A spokesman for the PSC said that applications often require amendments and the situation was not unique to NYRI. A NYRI spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.