Monongalia County Commission wants to sit down with NextEra
The Mid-Atlantic Resiliency Link, or MARL, is a 105-mile, 550-kilovolt 'major highway' of overhead transmission lines stretching from Greene County, Pa. to Frederick County, Va.
It's to be constructed by NextEra by the end of 2031.
While the exact path from Point A to Point B has yet to be selected, Monongalia, Preston, Hampshire and Mineral counties are within the route selection study area in West Virginia. Maryland's Allegany and Garrett counties are also included, as is Fayette County in Pennsylvania.
The project will require a 200-foot right of way along its entire length, and some residents in the potentially-impacted areas have started organizing and voicing concerns about the possibility of an 'electricity superhighway' running through or near their properties. The possible impacts are made more disturbing, critics say, because rural parts of West Virginia will serve as no more than a pass-through in order to plug in a power hungry portion of northern Virginia that serves as the data center hub of the east coast.
Monongalia County Commissioner Sean Sikora said representatives from NextEra initially indicated they would be in town, so the commission scheduled a work session following its June 25 meeting.
'After providing that availability, we scheduled a meeting and they indicated that they weren't available,' Sikora said. 'So, I relayed to them my displeasure that they didn't come to talk to us because we've been getting a lot of correspondence regarding this project, and we're not hearing from them. All we're hearing is from the public.'
In an emailed response, NextEra Senior Development Director Kaitlin McCormick assured the commission that no decisions have been made about the route of the project, and that the path chosen by the company will ultimately be subject to review by the public service commissions of the impacted states.
Further, she reminded the commission that the company recently held eight open houses across the project study area to collect public input.
Lastly, McCormick reiterated NextEra's belief that the project could generate anywhere from $150 million to $400 million in tax revenue for West Virginia and $50 million to $100 million for Monongalia depending on the route selected.
McCormick and other NextEra representatives originally sat down with the commission in December to generally describe the project and let the body know Monongalia County is within its route study area.
Many of the communications being received by the commission of late are highlighting the actions of its Preston County counterpart. On May 29, the Preston County Commission passed a resolution opposing the MARL project as currently proposed and urging state and federal regulators, as well as NextEra, to halt any development of the project through Preston County.
Sikora has said the Mon Commission is looking into the matter.
'The commission is doing its fact finding to understand all angles of the project. Just because we've been silent doesn't mean we're not getting educated on the issue,' he said. 'It's the intent of this commission to generally research issues and make sure we have all the facts before we weigh in.'
It's expected that at least one member of the commission plans will attend a community-organized meeting planned for 1 p.m. Sunday at Rexroad Auction, located at 887 Rexroad Farm Road, in Bruceton Mills.
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