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By Kevin Allen
Rappahannock News Staff Writer
Opposition to a new 500,000-volt power line corridor in Rappahannock County is amping up as more residents join in the fight to prevent Dominion Virginia Power from building a new set of towers in the eastern part of the county.
More than 300 people tunneled into Rappahannock County High School’s auditorium on Feb. 22 for a power line presentation sponsored by the Piedmont Environmental Council and the Rappahannock League for Environmental Protection.
“There are no good places to build a power line when the need to build a power line has not been established,” RLEP President Paul Farmer said at the beginning of the meeting. “The need to build this power line has not been established.”
From there, PEC President Chris Miller launched into an in-depth presentation that described the size and shape of the proposed towers, questioned Dominion’s reasons for building the new corridor and suggested energysaving measures that can help eliminate the need for new power lines.
Dominion executives have said additional power lines are needed to meet the electricity demands of Northern Virginia’s growing population. Company officials predict existing lines may become overloaded as soon as the summer of 2011 if more energy is not pumped into the area via a new transmission corridor.
Of the four routes Dominion is considering for the new right-of-way, the existing 500,000-volt corridor that passes through Rappahannock has been deemed the company’s preferred option. The three other proposed routes - one underground and two aboveground - roughly track Interstate 66 in northern Fauquier County.
An option to bury the line along I66 has not been removed from consideration, but Dominion officials estimate such a project would cost $1.7 billion. The “preferred” route along the existing corridor is estimated to cost $210 million and a new aboveground corridor along 1-66 would cost an estimated $150 million.
Dominion’s Web site says the company will submit the four corridor proposals to the State Corporation
See PEC, Page A5
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