MORNING SENTINEL • April 22, 2020
Central Maine Power claims that most of the jobs to build the NECEC transmission corridor will be filled by Maine workers and create equipment reliability. Only 36 permanent jobs will be created. The jobs lost in the recreation, biomass, solar and offshore wind industry will far out way the benefits of this temporary boom. Eight years ago, after Iberdrola bought CMP, they built up the electrical grid with a $1.6 billion project they called the Equipment Reliability Project. Maine ratepayers paid for this on our power bills. Since then CMP went from the top of the J.D Power list in customer satisfaction to the bottom. CMP says that an additional $200 million of the cost to build the transmission corridor will again be for equipment reliability. This is a hard sell to my neighbors without power who lost much-needed food at a time of a terrible pandemic. The only reliability seen from this project is a reliable yearly $60 million profit for Spanish CMP and $350 million for Hydro Quebec. ~ Ed Buzzell, Pittsfield