Late last year, the Cuomo administration laid out its agenda to address New York’s future energy requirements. All this week, reporters from the Innovation Trail are putting different parts of that complex energy puzzle under the microscope.
In this first report, Matt Richmond examines the goals of that plan, known as the Energy Highway Blueprint.
It’s easy to miss this red-brick building. It’s on a residential street outside of Albany. There’s no sign telling drivers that the flow of all the electricity in New York State is being controlled inside.
The organization at the controls is the New York Independent System Operators or NYISO. They’re a non-profit created after New York’s energy markets were opened up in the ‘90s.
“Somebody once described us kind of like the air traffic controller for electricity and that’s actually a pretty good description,” says NYISO spokesman Dave Flanagan.
About 11,000 miles of transmission lines and more than 300 power plants are monitored from 6 computer consoles at NYISO’s control center.
Flanagan says the biggest challenge is making sure power gets to New York City.
“We have really a surplus of electricity but we are limited in some cases in our ability to get the electricity from areas where we have those surpluses to areas where the demand is greatest,” says Flanagan.
Albany: energy bottleneck
Flanagan says bottlenecks around Albany are the main issue.
Most power travels from Western New York eastward to Albany and then south down the Hudson Valley into New York City. Often, around Albany, there’s just too much power trying to get to New York City. That means higher prices in the city and a reduced market for upstate producers.
Flanagan says a mixture of expanded transmission and new power sources would address the problem.
That’s where Governor Cuomo’s Energy Highway Blueprint comes in. It’s a series of proposals, leading to an estimated $5.7 billion in investment in the next 10 years, to increase power transmission and generation.
Donna De Costanzo, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council applauds the parts of the plan that focus on clean energy.
“We need to make sure that what’s being brought down from our transmission lines is clean,” says De Costanzo.
The blueprint calls for $250 million in renewable energy contracts and $35 million more in transmission upgrades to connect new sources to the state’s grid.
Indian Point could be made redundant
De Costanzo says renewable energy and efficiency upgrades could supply enough power to replace Indian Point, the nuclear power plant 40 miles north of New York City.
“It’s clear that we do need to do something about Indian Point when a natural disaster, many of which we’ve seen in the last couple of years, including an earthquake, flooding and tornadoes, could shut the plant down or trigger a disaster,” says De Costanzo.
Closing Indian Point isn’t included in the Energy Highway. But Gov. Cuomo has argued for its closure since 2011.
But Jerry Kremer, chairman of the New York Affordable Reliable Electricity Alliance, says the governor’s plan would be most useful if closing Indian Point was left off the table.
“The whole idea for the energy highway is to find ways to improve transmission and to get new sources and not to throw a monkey wrench into an existing source,” says Kremer.
Critics argue CHPE creates no new jobs
He also criticizes a separate transmission project called the Champlain Hudson Power Express project, which would bring power from Canada directly into New York City.
“The problem with Champlain Express is that it’s like taking the power from Canada and having one long extension cord into New York City. It creates no new jobs,” says Kremer.
That proposal is waiting for approval.
Kremer argues the focus should primarily be on carrying additional upstate-produced power into the city.
Some of the projects included in the Energy Highway are just starting this year and many will run past 2018.
