Sunday, June 14, 2020

POINTLESS CMP CORRIDOR REFERENDUM



“The End Is Near!” was a recurring theme in the old Mad Magazine which ceased publishing last summer after a 67-year run. As a kid I read it religiously and was surprised it stayed around that long as I hadn’t seen a copy for decades. Turning pages of each new edition in the fifties and sixties, I’d see caricature variations of a gray-bearded man in a robe carrying a sign warning of impending apocalypse. MAD satirized everything; it was totally unserious and that appealed to me.


Some of that unseriousness is still in me, especially when hearing leftist Democrats preach variations of their “The End Is Near” rhetoric. They’ve long sermonized about doom from “global warming” or “climate change” during which the polar ice caps and alpine glaciers will ostensibly melt, flood the oceans, and kill millions unless we “Repent Now!” by abandoning fossil fuels, buying carbon credits, and totally switching over to windmills and solar panels.


Used to be they included hydroelectricity in their “clean energy” pantheon, but it seems to have fallen from grace. Nearly everywhere I’m seeing “NO CMP CORRIDOR” lawn signs after a referendum campaign put the question on Maine’s November ballot. Central Maine Power has plans to construct a powerline in western Maine to carry electricity from Hydro Quebec to Massachusetts.


Twice I’ve questioned champions of this movement about their reasons for opposing the line. Their biggest arguments were that, one: it would be unsightly, and two: it would cut trees along its route from the Canadian border to southern Maine. “What’s wrong with that?” I asked. “Well, trees absorb carbon dioxide and help prevent climate change,” was their answer.


I should disclose here that I’m not a believer in human-caused climate change and have written numerous columns over the years refuting it. When discussing the corridor issue, however, I didn’t proselytize; I just tried to understand the opposition. I’ve read the literature on their web sites like: https://www.nocmpcorridor.com and others and I’m still confused. The New England region needs more electricity and no combinations of solar panels and windmills can produce enough no matter how heavily they’re subsidized.


But this column isn’t about the deficiencies of “renewable energy.” It’s about trying to make sense of leftist/environmentalist opposition to hydroelectricity from Quebec. If they’re so worried about carbon emissions and global warming, what sense does it make to oppose hydroelectricity which doesn’t emit carbon? Yes, some trees would be cut down in a corridor for a new powerline, but other green things will grow there. Look at older power line corridors all over the landscape. There’s plenty of growth under the lines and it absorbs carbon too. 

Go to nocmpcorridor.com and look at the arguments; they’re the weakest I’ve ever seen in a political campaign:


“A 53 mile corridor the width of the New Jersey Turnpike would cut through western Maine, crossing some of the country's last native brook trout habitat, fragile wetlands, deer yards and ruining pristine scenic views,” it claims. Trout streams are not endangered. Neither are deer yards, or fragile wetlands. I concede that views would be compromised, but that’s it.


“Countless jobs in the biomass industry and related forest products industries would be put in jeopardy” the site claims. Really? How?

“Tourism is the number one industry in Maine, and this corridor will jeopardize those jobs,” it says. Really? Seasonal homes need electricity. So do campgrounds, hotels, restaurants, and just about all other tourist infrastructure. How, exactly, will a power line jeopardize those jobs? I can’t imagine.


The only plausible reason leftist/environmentalist groups oppose the CMP corridor is hinted at: “This corridor would jeopardize Maine’s renewable energy sector, which could lose hundreds of millions of dollars over the next fifteen years as a direct result of this project.” I guess they’re afraid that lots of clean electricity coming down from Canada would negate any need for additional “renewable sources” and, hence, the need for further taxpayer subsidies of their cherished wind and solar projects.


Wind and solar industries can’t survive without taxpayer subsidies because they cost more than they deliver and don’t produce energy on calm, cloudy days. To this writer, it looks like the NO CMP CORRIDOR movement is mostly afraid of losing its continued access to the government teat.


The whole campaign is tailor-made for a MAD Magazine spoof. Too bad it’s not around anymore.

ADDENDUM: Maine’s CMP Corridor was proposed after the “Northern Pass” project was rejected in neighboring New Hampshire. 

13 comments:

Nick Peace said...

A small swath of powerlines through a vast uninhabited wilderness. Doesn't seem bad to me as long as 1) it doesn't cut through scenic tourist areas and 2) the state of Maine is able to get some good benefits out of it.

cowboy ted said...

Is CMP going to pay Maine customers for going through the state to supply MASS.?

Kafir said...

The environmental whackos never objected to the unsightly 22 turbines built by Angus King’s company, Record Hill Wind, in Roxbury, ME. He bilked the taxpayers with Obama’s help on that abomination. Pretty smooth crony capitalist who is still doing the bidding of the climate change frauds in DC.

Brian said...

Reading a column on climate change from Tom would be like reading a column on geography by a flat-earther, a column on autism by an anti-vaccine nut, or a column on racism by Tom.

Unknown said...

The lines are already in existence for that delivery of power from Maine to Mass as the old Maine Yankee lines are there still.... But if your talking about telling them to stop raising our delivery rates until x amount of time to offset the windfall they are going to get as a result of delivering megawatts through their lines? I'm all for it. Seems to me we need an in depth look and expose on who's on this board that approves rate hikes... How are they appointed and what's their background? Cause you just know the fix is in there right?

But clean energy from hydro is fantastic.... And CMP would be smart to exploit the hypocrisy of the opposition to this.

Unknown said...

And reading a rebuttal from you is like saying ANTIFA is just concerned for justice and fairness and rationality in the world today...
But thank you for your input skippy

Unknown said...

Nothing to see here folks.... Move along.....
He's a good carbon credit card carrying liberal so back off or we will brand you as a climate denier.....

CaptDMO said...

Oddly, the power will have to travel past a "lightly used" Nuclear Reactor #2 on it's way to Boston, and surrounding areas.
I'm ASSUMING a path along coastal Amtrack in Portland, to Boston.

Cover Charge said...

Tom, once the power lines are in that corridor will be sprayed with a very powerful herbicide that kills all plant life and flows into small streams on a reoccurring schedule depending on growth rates. The companies (Eastern Maine Electric, Emera, CMP) as well as the State claim that the spray is safe and becomes inert once in contact with the ground but I have my doubts. They also are not supposed to spray near bodies of water. This is done quietly and they will usually opt for trimming in populated areas where they will be seen. The Government does the same thing on the U.S Canadian border. I have seen it and I don’t like it. They don’t spray every year so yes on the years they don’t spray grass and small shrubs will grow so usually it is green beneath them. I also don’t like the wind turbines but I am a huge fan of Solar and see no drawbacks at all from Solar.

Fisher Joe said...

Maine's North Woods are the largest wild area east of the Mississippi and a place where people can live basically off the grid as they live off the land. The trout most certainly will be effected. Brook trout are so exquisitely sensitive to development that even rural landscapes in many Maine counties have completely lost local populations. CMP plans to include a “riparian buffer,” which will preserve some vegetation around the stream crossings. They also will be removing taller trees that might encroach on the power line. The height of vegetation in those buffers will amount to a “scrub/shrub habitat,” inadequate to prevent the negative effects on the trout ecosystem. Trout need a forest canopy to shade the water and keep it cool. Trout need the nutrients from leaves and twigs and fallen trees to create hiding places, and a strong root system to prevent excessive sediments from damaging their gills and burying their graveled nesting spots. Why would we believe corporate-speak telling us these things magically won't happen? Do we believe they value things like the unique beauty of Maine or the ecosystems of something worthless to them, like trout? No, we know what they value.

TRD said...

"so back off or we will brand you as a climate denier....." said a non-thinking unknown.

Liberals don't have to brand him one, let him speak for himself -


Tom - "I should disclose here that I’m not a believer in human-caused climate change"

I'm sure his flat-earth card is also in the mail, but I will let him speak for himself when it arrives.

I would dare him to read and actually think about the column below:

https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2019/04/former-climate-change-denier-explains-his-shift/

Tom McLaughlin said...

I'm not going to argue the issue here. Been there; done that. For a sample of my writing on this, go here:
http://tommclaughlin.blogspot.com/search?q=global+warming

Ben said...

This isn't a political issue at all----it's about common sense and money. Common sense in that any native mainer worth his salt sees this as absoutley superfluous bs meant to benefit anyone but us ( 'us' being the natives, not massholes playing redneck). We are the last hold out for native brook trout in the country for crying out loud and this is obviously a threat to these fish. As a fisherman and hunter I find this proposal to be greedy and abhorrent with potentially devastating outcomes to local fish populations, do the math, do the research and see what losing more native brookies would do to the economy. Not to mention our way of life. This benefits our neighbors to the north and south not us. And it's not about 'lefties' or any such weaponized newspeak. It's about common sense and economics. And quite frankly I've had enough bs from massholes lately so anything further benefiting the most obnoxious aholes in this country doesn't play too well.

Maine doesn't benefit from this, foreign interests and massholes do. No brainer.