Off the grid: Utilities look for ways to deal with increased power demand

BRATTLEBORO -- Probably not this year and maybe not next year, but someday soon, southern Vermont's existing electric power grid is just not going to cut it any longer.

The system that transfers electricity across the state "is vulnerable to an unplanned loss of a transmission line and transformer much of the time," said Vermont Electric Power Co. spokesman Kerrick Johnson.

"The Brattleboro area system is vulnerable to an unplanned loss of a line or transformer 100 percent of the time," he said.

Industry experts agree that something needs to be done to remedy the situation before it's too late.

"Based on the data we've seen preliminarily, some kind of action needs to be taken to ensure the reliability of that part of the system," said Department of Public Service spokesman Stephen Wark. "The question is: how do you do that?"

For several years, VELCO and Central Vermont Public Service Corp. have been

In recent months, the two electric utility companies have rolled out a set of proposed solutions to the local and regional issues. The most dramatic of these -- the expansion of a 51-mile power line stretching from Vernon to Cavendish -- has attracted a great deal of attention recently in the communities it will affect.

But the expanded line, called the Coolidge Connector, is just one of several components to the plan. And spokesmen for the two companies caution that, if electricity demand can be contained, the line's expansion could be nixed -- or at the very least, deferred.

The problem is both regional and local, as are the power companies' proposed solutions.

VELCO, a statewide entity, distributes electricity in bulk throughout Vermont. It is, in effect, the "highway" of electrical transmission.

CVPS, on the other hand, provides local service to a smaller portion of Vermont -- mostly in the southern and central sections.

VELCO's Coolidge Connector is the primary artery through which electricity flows to get from southern Vermont to northeastern Vermont -- where its demand is increasing rapidly.

"There are growing needs in the state of Vermont," said Erin O'Brien, spokeswoman for ISO New England, which monitors the energy load throughout six states in the region, "particularly in the far northern areas of Vermont."

The local problem stems from strains in the East-West line, a 66-mile line that runs from Brattleboro to Bennington, via Winhall. That line provides electricity to most homes in Windham and Bennington counties.

"It's getting close to its capacity," said CVPS director of integrating planning Bruce Bentley.

Over the course of nearly two years, according to Johnson and CVPS spokesman Steve Costello, the two companies convened an unprecedented series of working groups and public forums to address the problems.

At first, according to Costello, CVPS considered widening the East-West corridor and adding a new set of transmission lines. While that solution would have addressed the local transmission problem, it would not have dealt with regional issues.

Furthermore, participants in the working group said they preferred "non-transmission alternatives" -- such as increased energy efficiency and localized generation -- rather than added power lines.

"The thought behind generation and efficiency programs is to reduce the need to build new lines," Costello said. "There's a chance (the line) will never get built if energy efficiency programs can reduce the demand."

"As we started to look at this and talking to VELCO, they had already begun thinking about (building the Coolidge Connector)," Bentley said. "We said 'it looks like the local problem and the regional problem have a little bit of overlap.'"

The groups determined that the installation of a synchronous condenser -- a motorized engine that can prop up voltage -- in the Winhall area could defer the need for a widened East-West line, so long as local demand for electricity can be kept under control.

Efficiency Vermont, the state's energy efficiency utility, has been enlisted in that effort. The company was directed by the Public Service Board in January to focus its efforts on regions of Vermont with the greatest need for energy efficiency -- the Southern Loop area included.

"We are developing plans to get far more aggressive in pursuing those targeted areas in the next year and a half. We're not there yet, but since we received the order, we've been developing strategies," said Efficiency Vermont director Blair Hamilton.

"This would be an unprecedented thing to use energy efficiency in this way to prevent the building of a line in this particular manner," Costello said.

The solution to the regional problem -- namely, the strains on the north-south Coolidge Connector -- are more difficult to fix, however, because so many more energy markets are involved.

To keep the Coolidge Connector running without interruption, according to Johnson, efficiency measures would have to be successful throughout the region -- not just in southern Vermont.

"It's going to take a coordinated effort and initiative by several parties -- perhaps primarily the distribution utilities -- working collaboratively along with Efficiency Vermont" and other organizations, Johnson said.

But Johnson believes non-transmission alternatives could potentially solve, or at least defer, the problem.

"We're going to control the things we can control -- CVPS and VELCO. We're going to recruit other party support and hopefully everyone will agree this is the right thing to do," he said.

But in case other measures are insufficient, VELCO is going forward with a permitting process that could eventually add an additional 345-killovolt transmission line along the 51-mile Coolidge Connector corridor.

VELCO has owned a 250-foot right-of-way stretching from Vernon to Cavendish since the 1960s, but it has only used 150 feet of that for the existing 345-killovolt line.

The expansion, if it is needed and approved by the Public Service Board, could mean that 100 feet of vegetation along the corridor would be cut to accommodate a second line. It would also necessitate a new substation in Vernon, just north of Entergy Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, and an expanded substation in West Dummerston.

A new three-quarter mile line linking the West Dummerston substation and the Coolidge Connector would also have to be cut.

Costello said he has "a pretty high confidence level" that the fixes on the East-West line will work.

"On the Coolidge Connector, we're optimistic cautiously. It's a harder road to hoe there. It's a larger issue that's not locally controllable," he said.

VELCO will continue to monitor the load level along the Coolidge Connector as the permitting process for its expansion moves ahead, Johnson said.

"We're going to have to make a decision about whether to proceed by the fall of 2008. If by that time the load reveals the line can be deferred, then we'll reexamine it," he said.

Johnson and Costello hope the non-transmission alternatives are successful. But even if they are not, they say, the steps their two companies have taken to deal with the problem are novel and replicable.

"Regardless of how this ends up, we've done something that nobody else has done in Vermont before, which is to really bring the public into the process earlier," Costello said. "Regardless of the final outcome, a lot of pieces of the puzzle are playing bigger roles than they might have otherwise."

The next article in this series will focus on the public process that led to the proposals.

Paul Heintz can be reached at pheintz@reformer.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 275.