Several Loudoun County elected officials showed up at Loudoun Valley High School in Purcellville Feb. 3 to voice their opposition to the proposed Potomac Appalachian Transmission Highline during a Virginia State Corporation Commission public hearing on the application.

Of the first 20 speakers at the hearing, only one was in favor of the PATH project, a power line proposed by American Electric Power and Allegheny Energy that, if built, will be 275 miles and 765,000 volts. It will stretch from West Virginia to Maryland, crossing Loudoun County north of Lovettsville for about 10 miles along the way.

Senior Hearing Examiner Alexander F. Skirpan Jr. presided over the hearing, during which Loudoun County Supervisors Jim Burton (I-Blue Ridge) and Sally Kurtz (D-Catoctin) spoke against the project along with Leesburg Town Councilman Dave Butler.

Burton noted that numbers from PJM Interconnection, which operates the regional power grid, continuously change, making the need for PATH questionable.

“This is just the latest example of the mumbo jumbo associated with this process,” Burton said.

He said that the only number that has remained constant is the 14.3 percent rate-of-return the power companies are set to make once PATH is in operation.

Kurtz spoke about how the line could affect Loudoun’s rural economy saying that the route’s “10.5 miles of industrial transmission lines become the dominant structure draping over all three northern entrances to Loudoun County. Harpers Ferry Road, Berlin Turnpike and Maryland Route 15 are historic roads and compose all three of Loudoun’s northern tourist gateways.”

She urged the power companies to give accurate visual simulations of what the monopoles will look like if built.

“Allegheny needs to prove there’s no tourism harm,” Kurtz said.

Leesburg Town Councilman Dave Butler spoke of his experience seeing the impact of the recent construction of a Dominion Power transmission line that cuts through Leesburg and is a quarter of a mile from his house.

“I certainly don’t wish to see the same thing happen to a greater stretch of Loudoun County,” Butler said, adding that he would like to see the SCC focus on conservation and “cleaner greener energy.”

Lovettsville Mayor Elaine Walker reiterated a February 2009 resolution by the Lovettsville Town Council that opposes one of the alternate routes for the line, a loop which would come close to the town.

The current proposed route for PATH runs along an existing power line. However, the power companies have added two possible loops from the existing right-of-way to account for conservation easements that may prevent them from building in certain areas of the existing line. Allegheny and AEP’s preferred route is staying with the existing line the entire way though.

During a public hearing on PATH held Feb. 2 in Winchester, statements from U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-10th) and state Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel (R-western Loudoun) were read into the public record.

“I still have yet to see anything to convince me that our region needs this transmission line project,” Wolf wrote in his statement. “Instead, all I see is that regions along the East Coast where the power will be shipped will reap the benefits while our region will only see huge, ugly towers strung with wire dotting the countryside, parks and backyards of the places we call home.”

“The construction of these massive structures will directly affect thousands of property owners in the vicinity who have invested their life savings in their land or whose families have owned the land for generations,” Vogel wrote in her statement. “Questions surrounding the potential detrimental effects on humans and livestock have not yet been answered.  To add to the injury, these same constituents must ultimately pay higher rates to fund the project for which they will receive no benefit.”

Using the latest load analysis data from PJM, representatives for the power companies say that PATH is needed by 2015 to prevent rolling blackouts throughout the entire eastern region – a region that comprises about 50 million people in 13 states and the District of Columbia. PJM recommends that PATH be constructed for the entire eastern grid to remain reliable.

In addition to the public officials who spoke out against PATH Feb. 3, many northern Loudoun residents also noted their opposition, including Malcolm Baldwin, who is running for the Democratic nomination for Kurtz’s seat on the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors since Kurtz is not seeking re-election this year.

Baldwin urged Skirpan to see the PATH project in the eyes of an energy historian looking back on it 50 years from now.

“…PATH reaches an east coast market that could far more cheaply, far more cleanly, with vastly less environmental and economic damage, be reliably served by efficiency measures, and by other energy generation right there in the market region,” he said. “That energy historian would wonder what we’d been smoking here in Virginia, or Maryland, West Virginia, and certainly in Washington, given the facts available and the alternatives.”

The first speaker at the Purcellville public hearing was Don Atkins, a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers from Salem. Atkins is a journeyman lineman who constructs and maintains power lines. He urged the SCC to accept PATH’s application in his comments.

“This project will provide much needed jobs in Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland,” Atkins said. “Not only will this project create jobs, it will also improve the local economies. For example, hotels, restaurants, gas stations and construction businesses will see increased revenues due to the construction. It is in my opinion that the PATH project will help Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland economies and the national economy, and as well, improve the national power grid.”

Those who could not attend either public hearing but would still like to file comments for or against the PATH project can do so by sending written correspondence referring to case number PUE-2010-00115 to the Clerk of the Commission, Document Control Center, P.O. Box 2118, Richmond, VA 23218. Comments can also be submitted online at http://www.scc.virginia.gov/case/index.aspx.

Formal hearings on PATH will continue in Richmond April 25 and May 16. A decision on the application is expected by late summer.