Maine State board deals potentially fatal blow to First Wind deal
By Naomi Schalit and John Christie, Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting
Last April, Maine’s largest wind energy developer, First Wind, trumpeted a multimillion-dollar deal that would pay for the company’s ambitious plans to erect more wind turbines throughout Maine and the Northeast.
But the Maine Public Utilities Commission dealt a potentially fatal blow to the deal last week.
PUC staff, faced with what opponents of the deal have called the first serious challenge to the state’s landmark 2000 electricity deregulation law, recommended on Jan. 13 that the agency give the thumbs-down to the deal.
“We deny approval of the ‘proposed Transactions’ as we find that the risk of harm to ratepayers exceeds the benefits,” the draft decision reads, “even if conditions intended to mitigate the risk of harm to ratepayers were imposed.”
The recommendation, which will be considered and voted on by the three agency commissioners on Jan. 31, caps a nine-month struggle over a deal that’s described in legal filings as being worth, “at the high end,” $880 million. The capital infusion to First Wind alone would amount to $333 million.
First Wind, Ontario-based Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp. and Emera Inc., the Nova Scotia-based parent company of Bangor Hydro and Maine Public Service, propose to jointly build and operate wind energy projects in Maine and elsewhere in the Northeast. After a failed bid to go public in 2010, which left First Wind cash-hungry, the deal is a way for the Boston-based company to continue building wind towers across Maine and the region and a way for Emera and Algonquin to reach new energy consumers in the U.S.
At last count, there were 312 legal filings with the PUC in the case, a brigade of lawyers from Maine’s top law firms and state agencies, briefs, motions and documents that reference Hemingway, Shakespeare and Lady Gaga, and a subpoena served on an Emera official by a retired Canadian Mountie.
The case before the PUC centered on two legal issues: Was the proposal in the interest of ratepayers and would the deal violate Maine’s Electric Restructuring Act.
The Electric Restructuring Act, which took effect on March 1, 2000, prohibits utilities from owning both transmission and generation of electricity, which forced the Maine’s utilities to sell off dams and power plants. After the restructuring, utilities were responsible only for delivering power while other companies produced it — all in an attempt to create more competition and lower electricity rates.
Parties to the First Wind deal asserted in filings that it would benefit ratepayers by providing “a substantial benefit in achieving the State’s aggressive wind energy targets,” lowering the price of electricity in the regional market and strengthening the finances of both Bangor Hydro and Maine Public Service. Proponents said the Electric Restructuring Act would not be violated because Bangor Hydro and Maine Public Service, the two regulated Maine utilities in the deal, would not actually own or “have any measure of control” over generation assets or hold a “financial interest” in them.
But Eric Bryant, an attorney for the Maine Public Advocate’s Office, which represents the interest of the state’s utility customers, said last week that his office opposed the First Wind deal because it could result in higher utility prices, thus violating a law that required a deal to do no harm to the interests of ratepayers.
Bryant said the plan also would violate the Electric Restructuring Act. Its complex corporate structure, he said, would amount to just what the law forbids — a utility controlling a power generator.
“It’s a virtual vertical utility,” said Bryant. “If we’re going to actually honor the restructuring act, you can’t allow this restructuring to happen.”
Anthony Buxton, lead attorney for industrial energy users including Verso, Huhtamaki and Madison Paper, who are opposed to the deal, said, “Maine is being asked to change its energy policy, dramatically. The interpretation of this part of the statute is incredibly important in keeping a competitive market for electricity prices in Maine.
“The question is whether the restructuring act will be kept whole,” he said, “or whether someone will drive a big hole in it.”
The PUC staff’s draft decision rejected arguments made by the deal’s opponents that the Electric Restructuring Act would be violated because an affiliate of the utility, not the utility itself, would own the generation assets.
The staff concluded, “The utilities will not have any equity interest or voting securities that will allow them to exercise any direct or indirect management control over the development or operation of generation assets within the meaning of the statute.”
Nevertheless, staff wrote that the proposed affiliation of Bangor Hydro and Maine Public Service with companies that will “develop, own and operate generation assets” raises “substantial concerns regarding the possible exercise of preferential treatment by a utility to its competitive affiliates.” That, in turn, could produce higher transmission rates and higher electricity prices.
“We firmly believe that the joint venture with Northeast Wind will bring significant benefits to Maine ratepayers and will lead to as much as $3 billion in investment in the Maine economy and its communities,” First Wind spokesman John Lamontagne said Thursday. “That will create hundreds of related jobs and generate more competitively priced clean, renewable energy for Maine homes and businesses.
JLL received an email asking for your help:
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| Some have suggested they change the name to "lastwind" |
Click on "contact us" button to leave an email. This comment came from one of the PPDLW officers:
I urge the commissioners to vote to affirm their legal counsel’s recommendation to deny the First Wind proposal when they vote at the end of the month. I also give credit for standing up for ratepayers (industrial and residential), and against inefficient new capacity additions to the grid that would raise rates.
7 comments:
Although this is incredibly significant stuff. We would rather here about the grey area nudie club next to the K of C hall in Rosiere.
Dancing Girls. See them live at Rosiere's newest hot spot.
"The Grey Area"
Well, that said. Nova Scotia's economy was decimated a while ago. It's always the same. Pump billions into these useless projects that make the rich richer all it tne name of "helping the economy" or something. They didn't care when they were robbing and pillaging, why now? Men put their women to work one way or another. Either standing up before a town and making absurd claims about the benefits of having a bunch of towers that will do nothing, or women who wrap themselves around poles in bars for men who do nothing. What's the difference? In the old days a fat woman was a sign of prosperity. I must be one rich American man. In time of war the women always entertain the troops. It's all about survival, and a little propaganda.
LETS HOPE THE BOOT JACK WIND THUG CARTEL MEMBERS TOOTH PICK PROJECT GOES DOWN IN FLAMES, IN MAINE !!!!!! THESE CROOKS WON'T STOP, NO MATTER HOW MANY POLITICIANS THEY HAVE TO PAY OFF, UNTILL THEY GET THEIR WAY !!!! KEEP TRACK OF THE WIND FRIENDLY POLITICIANS AND THEN DO THE RIGHT, VOTE THEM OUT OF OFFICE AT THE FIRST CHANCE YOU GET....... THAT IS ALL THEY UNDERSTAND...... THEY REALLY HATE LEAVING THE PUBLIC TROUGH AND BE FORCED TO GET A REAL JOB, THATS LIKE TOO MUCH WORK !!!!
Hey Louie, you must have one ugly wife if you want to visit strip clubs or have a lot of wind mill money to waste.
There are some similarities in Nova Scotia. Falmouth in particular. The fishing industry went through the same thing local fishing did in the area. GATT rules destroyed the local fishing economy. Businesses disappeared, stores sgut down, Schools lost funding. They do the same thing everywhere, and it's global. Whatever keeps money within the community is better than anything else. Recirculation of money within a community is the best thing for the economy. Not global trade. I'm sure there are some "capitalists" who will disagree. They don't care which way the door swings anyway.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_federal_political_scandals_in_the_United_States This is a list of scandals from both parties for the last 50 years. Sorry, corruption knows no party lines.
As Maine goes, maybe the Cape will go out in the next tide. Being Canadian is a real pleasure.
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