Misleading Powerline Legislation

Photo by Laura Stutzman

Marylanders are experiencing record-high electric bills. Consumers comparing their monthly bills from early 2024 soon figure out the dramatic increase is not because they’re using more power; it's that the fees have doubled or tripled. With little wiggle room for many household budgets, complaints have made their way up the political chain and into the Maryland General Assembly.

With a sea of energy-related bills before lawmakers in Annapolis and sorting through the 2025 legislative calendar, keeping up with the details of each bill could easily slip through the cracks. If legislation can help ease utility costs for constituents, Senators and Delegates will bite. However, the solution to high electric costs is more complex than putting up more powerlines, particularly ones that tear through valuable protected lands in the mountains of Maryland and open the door to destroying other delicate ecosystems throughout the state.

Western Maryland residents are outraged over Maryland Senate Bill 399 and House Bill 1270, which ask to allow overhead transmission lines to be constructed through Western Maryland's protected Wildlands. SB399 has already passed through the respective houses with ease, and HB1270 passed through the Economic Matters Committee and is soon to see the General Assembly floor for a vote. Unfortunately, representatives blindly supporting this legislation have been misled and are complicit in upending 52 years of legal protections for untouched areas in Maryland.

Policy strategists have discovered the bottom line for misguided support on both bills. Maryland legislators are supporting legislation for transmission lines, thinking that it will help lower electric bills for their constituents. Legislators have been falsely told that allowing more out-of-state power across Maryland soil is the solution. The truth is that clearing the path for new transmission lines will increase electric bills, not reduce them.

Rate increases for the consumer are predominantly from the construction of new transmission lines, with minimal price fluctuation from daily power generation. Rushing to clear Maryland's legal “constraints” that protect its Wildlands is an avenue to reap earlier profits for the power company. Yet, it will increase infrastructure fees for rate-payers and end users. Additionally, lifting these constraints moves Maryland backward in its recent gains in conservation and resource protection.

The reason the two bills are raising the dander of Western Maryland residents is that the new overhead transmission line proposal by NextEra Energy has its sights on protected Wildlands and their backyard. Claiming the route through the Wildlands will minimize impacts for residents, NextEra Energy assumed they had the sales pitch right. People who live in and visit the Appalachian region feel differently about their surroundings, which are bucolic environments they treasure and hold in high regard. They’ll be damned if a big corporation is going to decimate it for profit.

That mindset was apparent at a March 13 Open House event hosted by Maryland DNR at their newest park acquisition known to locals as Savage River Lodge. This was the community's first meeting organized around the transmission lines, even though both bills supporting the project were on their way to being passed. The former resort, once privately owned, is far from most local folks, which was part of its original appeal for vacationers. Despite the access challenges, many of the 130 attendees traveled an hour to voice their concerns. Not surprisingly, the event gathered minds sternly opposed to the transmission line project. Several DNR representatives, including DNR Secretary Josh Kurtz, were on hand to answer questions, but few attendees knew what to ask, and there was no formal presentation or overview of the proposed project offered by DNR. Secretary Kurtz's presence in Western Maryland, particularly on this controversial issue before the bill even passes, is notable.

DNR hosts an "Open House" to gather public comments about the overhead transmission lines project.

“This reminds me of when EMM was battling for a 2017 fracking ban against savvy, well-connected gas and oil lobbyists,” said Mark Stutzman, Communications Director and founding president of Engage Mountain Maryland. “There is nothing more frustrating and unjust than discovering legislators are misinformed or misled about a bill’s details or considering the opinions of their constituents. We ultimately won the fracking ban battle, and I’m hopeful reason will prevail, and we will win this one too.”

Even if the Maryland General Assembly doesn’t pass both bills to remove the restrictions from the three Wildlands, NextEra Energy may still build towers through an alternate route bypassing the sensitive areas. Either way, coal and gas-fired power plants in Pennsylvania will deliver tons of power to Northern Virginia. You read that right. All this hubbub, yet Marylanders are not recipients of the electricity carried through unwanted overhead lines. This is another bone of contention for those opposing the legislation since Maryland can opt out of becoming a conduit for out-of-state power delivery altogether.

Outside of Dulles Airport in Northern Virginia, demand for electricity has surged due to the rapid expansion of data processing centers. The over one hundred centers consume nearly four times that of typical facilities worldwide. That’s enough energy to power two million homes, which explains the insatiable electricity needs of these facilities and the eagerness for power providers to oblige them. In addition, 200 more data centers are in the cue for that region. That kind of commercial energy demand eclipses that of residential consumers. This issue is just a blip in the overarching energy grid dilemma. Increased demand is a serious and growing problem with more electric-powered vehicles and digital interconnectivity. The whir of flowing current has grown from the size of a garden to a fire hose. The key is to avoid creating a regrettable footprint to satisfy the demand.

“It seems the problem should be left for Virginia to figure out,” Stutzman quips. “They have developed irresponsibly and should solve their problems rather than asking other states to rescue them. Western Maryland has given its opulent mountain ridges to wind turbines, mined its coal, harvested its timber, and relinquished farmland to solar,” he continues. “We’ve done our part, so it’s someone else's turn.”