Pepco MAPP project should seek alternative site

Pepco MAPP project should seek alternative site

Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2011

As reported in the Jan. 28 edition of The Calvert Recorder, the Calvert County Board of County Commissioners took a major step last month by petitioning Maryland's Public Service Commission to intervene in its proceedings on Pepco's Mid-Atlantic Power Pathway Project (MAPP) in order to help protect the interests of the county and its residents as this massive, multi-billion dollar power project is considered in the months ahead.
This was very welcome news, especially the statements by Commissioners' President Susan Shaw (R) that expressed concern over Pepco's proposal to cover acres of farm and forest land at the headwaters of Parkers Creek.
As The Calvert Recorder also reported, we are only now learning that Pepco's proposed facilities on that site would be the largest of their kind in North America.
Pepco's efforts to upgrade the power grid and the interests of the county and its residents in ensuring that these facilities are properly sited certainly need not be irreconcilable. So, it is also encouraging that the county commissioners have asked that talks continue between the county's director of economic development, Linda Vassallo, and Pepco representatives on finding alternative, more acceptable building sites other than the Parkers Creek site.
Let's hope the county now takes the next step and makes it crystal clear to Pepco that building its proposed industrial facilities at the Parkers Creek headwaters site is simply a non-starter.
Yes, other sites can and should continue to be considered, but Pepco needs to get a clear message that the Parkers Creek site is off the list entirely.
Long before Pepco set its sights on this area of farm and forest land to construct its enormous power conversion and switching stations, the Parkers Creek watershed was already one of the county's crowning achievements in sensible zoning, land planning and land conservation.
Over the course of more than 25 years, county officials, state agencies, land conservation groups such as American Chestnut Land Trust and the Nature Conservancy, and hundreds of volunteer citizens have all made great strides in protecting Parkers Creek and its surrounding watershed lands, making it one of the small wonders on the entire western shore of the Chesapeake Bay.
This work continues today and will need to continue for many more years to come.
We can have better, more reliable electric power and still preserve the natural legacy and rural landscape of the Parkers Creek watershed for all future generations.
All it takes is for people of goodwill to commit to working together, starting with the understanding that large industrial power facilities will not be placed where they really don't belong.
Paul Dennett, Port Republic
The writer is a former member of the ACLT board of directors and is a member of Calvert Citizens for Safe Energy.