It is irresponsible for an ISO New England (ISO NE) spokesman to imply that his organization should have no role in the public debate over relicensing of the Northfield Mountain Pumped Storage (NMPS) station. His statement in the Nov. 11 Recorder article “Nonprofit criticized for leniency with FirstLight” that ISO NE doesn’t “own or operate any generation resources” and has “no investment in FirstLight or involvement in their relicensing process” is disingenuous, at best. ISO NE runs the grid literally minute-by-minute, by directing generation facilities to go online and offline as needed, to balance changes in electrical loads with changes in generation outputs. Consequently, ISO NE knows better than anyone else precisely what benefit (if any) NMPS provides in the daily task of “keeping the lights on.” Therefore, ISO NE’s role in this debate should be to clearly explain this benefit (if any) to the public and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in plain language. I challenge ISO NE to do so now, at least in our local newspapers. If ISO NE continues to disavow any responsibility in this matter, we should urge our federal representatives to intervene.
Furthermore, it has been alleged that state and federal environmental agencies and laboratories, including the Silvio O. Conte Fish Laboratory, have been compliant or even silent in this debate. These entities have many experts in river wildlife biology, hydraulics, and the environment in general. The agencies’ role in this should be to help to define the environmental costs of the operation of the NMPS station, and to clearly explain these costs to the public and FERC. I challenge these environmental agencies and laboratories to weigh in now, at least in our local newspapers. If they continue to be silent, we should urge our federal representatives to replace the agencies’ top management, and to re-think agency and laboratory funding.
Robert Dickerman
Northfield