Almost 20 years ago, after the 2001 SW MN 345 kV line (01-1958) opened the floodgates, and after the 2005 legislative changes to Certificate of Need and Transmission siting laws, many utilities jointly applied for Big Stone transmission — PUC Dockets CN-05-619 and TL-05-1275. Here’s the map:
Let’s take a look at what’s proposed for Big Stone-Alexandria-Big Oaks, CN-22-538, TL-23-159:
The western end of this is looking familiar… these folks have to go through this AGAIN?
A comment period has been announced for Minnesota Power & GRE’s “Northern Reliability Project,” which is Public Utilities Commission Docket E015,ET2/CN-22-416 (the Certificate of Need only).
Plenty of time to read and think and write.
This time around, they’re looking for substantive comments regarding whether a Certificate of Need should be granted, so a look at the statutory criteria could be helpful:
CERTIFICATE OF NEED — SEE CRITERIA IN SUBD. 3
What the Public Utilities Commission says it’s looking for is:
As far as the rules are concerned, IF YOU IDENTIFY ANY CONTESTED ISSUES OF FACT, this is the time to request a contested case, essentially a trial, via Office of Administrative Hearings. Any request for a contested case must be made before the end of the comment period.
Here’s the full Notice:
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