Dutton resident Katrina Martin says an international power line proposed, in part, through Pondera and Teton counties in northcentral Montana is being built on the backs of the farmers.

Martin has voiced her concern about the diagonal portion of the Montana Alberta Tie Ltd.'s proposed private transmission line since the company announced the project in December 2005.

The 215-mile, 230-kilovolt power line project to be built between Great Falls and Lethbridge, Alta., is in the final stages of regulatory approval on both sides of the border. An environmental impact statement was published this spring that outlines three possible routes for the line in Montana.

MATL is a Calgary, Alta.-based energy transmission company whose tie line would connect the electricity markets of Alberta and Montana. According the MATL, the line will enable the development of new wind energy projects by linking the renewable and emission-free source of power to consumers across North America.

In a recent interview, Martin said that MATL's preferred route, Alternative 2, forces an estimated 70 landowners to negotiate a route with diagonal lines in cropland or in CRP (Conservation Reserve Program) while Alternative 4 has only 28 miles of diagonal lines. "That's a lot better than 54 miles," Martin said, using the total miles of diagonal lines in Alternative 2.

Farmers would be paid a one-time payment for their right of way, an annual fee for each pole and an extra fee to offset the cost of farming around each pole.

Although three routes are discussed, MATL says if Alternative 4 is chosen, the line is unlikely to be built.

"The environmental review process is just a sham. What is the sense of having a review process?" Martin said. (Alternative 3 runs along the mostly diagonal NorthWestern Energy power line, a route that neither MATL or landowners want either, Martin said.)

She said Alternative 2 has a few places that were selected on the basis of low impacts to farmers, but the vast majority of the line is "a marching diagonal south of Conrad."

The existing economic development, namely farmers on the ground, has to pay a "terrible price for the speculative proposal that wind farms would be developed," Martin said.

MATL Vice President Bob Williams, in a recent interview, said that Alternative 4 would have a substantial additional cost and would delay the project one year.

"We have not done environmental studies along that route," Williams said, explaining that MATL did extensive field studies for a year on Alternatives 2 and 3. "We did not do the same field studies on Alternative 4," he said.

The MATL Web site states, however, that right-of-way review and preparation is part of the construction process.

"We removed a lot of the diagonal lines on Alternative 2. Route changes have gone to a more south arrangement and we have successfully negotiated easements with a number of landowners," Williams said. "A diagonal is not necessarily a bad thing. It depends on where it is placed," he added.

A check with the Teton County Clerk and Recorder's office shows that 19 landowners have signed easements with MATL starting in December 2005 until August 2006. No activity was recorded after that. The easements are for a 45-foot-wide easement with a 30-foot-wide safety zone on either side if an H-frame is built, 20 feet if a monopole is constructed.

Martin said MATL asserts that Alternative 4, which was developed with input from landowners, is outside the study area for the project. "The increased cost of $7 million [to build Alternative 4] has been in front of the company for months, plenty of time to obtain additional financing," she said.

MATL reported that the cost of the MATL line is $150 million.

Williams added that MATL risks losing its wind-energy customers if it encounters indefinite delays in completing the line.

He said MATL is committed to finding a way to work with affected landowners to minimize the effect of the line on their property. MATL would at least keep the landowners economically whole through mitigation and compensation, he said.

"We have said the line design will take into consideration the way each landowner uses the land," Williams said.

He said MATL has revamped the MATL Web site, www.matl.ca, to provide more information for landowners. MATL has been working on the update for several months, partly because of an Alberta Energy and Utilities Board directive obligating MATL to form a better relationship with Albertan landowners along the right of way.

To that end, MATL has initiated preliminary meetings regarding appropriate dispute resolution with the help of a consultant. A series of meetings took place in March and MATL must report its progress to the Alberta board. "We are doing everything we possibly can to meet the April 30 deadline," Williams said.

He added that MATL hired a land manager, James McCorquodale, who has experience in negotiations.

"Our land manager has a considerable amount of land experience. We have heard the concerns," Williams said, referring to complaints landowners voiced about MATL's land agents.

Williams said that previous talks with Montana landowners went poorly. "It probably created the wrong relations with landowners and we are trying to turn that around," he said.

He pointed to the latest environmental impact statement, noting the number of routing options it describes.

"We have learned something. We have learned a tremendous amount," he said. He explained his company is committed to continuous improvement, and to making a number of changes. "There is always something new to learn. We accept and expect that," Williams said.

Martin said Alternative 4 would have the least impact on landowners and it should be the chosen route, based on the analysis.

She asked, "Why have a review process," if MATL's preferred route is the only one that could be selected?

The line's routing options have been known to MATL for months, Martin said. "If Alternative 2 is the only one that can be considered, what's the point?" She said MATL had an "irresponsible attitude" when it comes to route selection.

"It's troublesome that people allow this company, this late in process, to say that Alternative 4 was not studied. It's wrong," she said.

She said the state's Major Facility Siting Act is there to do an analysis of an applicant's project and has mandated that steps be taken to mitigate environmental impacts.

She noted that Sen. Jerry Black (R-Shelby) is "campaigning very hard" to get the MATL line approved, but the line runs north-south, not diagonally, in his district.

"Diagonal lines are bad public policy. I don't understand why the neighbors [to the north of Conrad] are willing to sacrifice their neighbors [to the south]; why elected representatives can cut off their own constituents," she said.

She said that MATL's parent company, Tonbridge Power's President Johan van't Hof says the company has had "no trouble coming up with money." If Montana is so convinced, then find the money to build it correctly, she said. "We have already given them $200 million in tax relief."

As far as the tax break is concerned, Martin said she wonders how the state will monitor the transported energy, when the wind developers have to buy back-up power on the spot market. "Who is going to tell whether it is not coming from coalbed methane?" she asked.

"We are giving the world away for something that is 30 percent efficient, she said, citing wind turbine statistics.

"Long sighted leadership. We need a little more of that," Martin said.

Meanwhile, Tom Ring, who is coordinating the regulatory approval process on the MATL project for the state Department of Environmental Quality, said he considers Alternative 4 to be a viable alternative. "We are not constrained to select what the applicant proposed," Ring said.

He said he had not heard that MATL would need a year to do additional environmental studies and he said he would follow up on that comment.

He said DEQ is also looking at whether MATL's prices for easements offered for farming around poles are adequate.

In Montana, the value of agricultural land is based on productivity and not on fair market value.

Choteau real estate broker and appraiser John Buck said that with the price of grain being as high as it has been lately, that could affect the value of land taken for easements.

Otherwise, ag land sells between $400 and $900 an acre depending on productivity.

He said that small parcels sell for more per acre than larger parcels, and the potential use is part of the value. He said the price paid for a power line easement, depending where it is, should be negotiable, because of the land's potential for other uses.

"Big power lines are a detractant," Buck said. "A standard power pole is a fact of life," but he added that a big pole presents a more complex issue because it affects mountain views, for example.

4/16/08