September 30, 1966
Page 24688
DEVELOPMENT OF NEW ENGLAND’S HYDROELECTRIC RESOURCES
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, for many years New Englanders have seen their industries flee the region for better economic climates. Many and varied reasons have been applied to this emigration including labor costs, taxes, availability of resources, and so forth.
However, there has been a propensity, on the part of some New England business leaders, to overlook one of the most basic reasons for this exodus -- excessive power costs. New England has long had the dubious distinction of having the highest electric rates in the Nation.
Today, the technology of the electric industry is such that there is no reason for any region to be denied low cost, abundant electric power. Advances in power technology, long-distance, extra-high voltage transmission and the economies available from giant thermal generating stations make lower electric rates possible even in New England.
Mr. President, it was not until after the election of President John F. Kennedy and renewed consideration of development of New England’s hydroelectric resources that the region’s private power utilities publicly recognized the existence of this new technology.
When the Congress began consideration of the Dickey-Lincoln School hydroelectric project on the St. John River in Maine the private power companies suddenly came up with a variety of methods for production of low cost electricity and last year’s authorization of that project has further prodded active consideration of lower cost power sources by New England power companies.
Already Dickey-Lincoln School, without a yard of concrete poured, is providing the "birch rod" of competition to New. England’s long sleeping utility industry. Mergers of inefficient utility operations are being effectuated and, every day, a new plan for development of low cost thermal power is suggested.
That these activities are a direct result of authorization of New England’s first Federal power yardstick is without question. Even though Dickey is primarily a peaking power project designed to meet needs during peak hours of power consumption, the fact remains that the 19th century philosophy of New England’s power companies is fast disappearing .
Construction of Dickey will assure a continuation of competition in New England. I am personally convinced that this project will serve as a symbol to all utilities in the region and will cause a tremendous impetus to the region’s economy. More importantly this project will provide an effective mechanism to assure consumer benefit from the savings achieved by power companies taking advantage of the "new" electric technology.
Recently the Textile Workers Union of America published an article entitled "The Baby TVA in Maine" saluting authorization of Dickey-Lincoln School and comparing the potential effect of this project with the progress made in the Tennessee Valley since 1933. I would like to insert that article at the end of my remarks.
The Textile Workers Union is to be congratulated for their recognition of the effect of exorbitant power costs on the economy of a region which, prior to emigration of industry, was the center of the textile industry.
There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
THE "BABY TVA" IN MAINE
(NOTE. All the people of New England, textile workers especially, have a vital stake in the success of the Dickey-Lincoln School project on the St. John River in Maine which would produce cheaper electric power for the area.
(This "little Tennessee Valley Authority" would not only stop the flight of business out of the region but would attract new industry. It would mean more jobs as well as the saving of jobs. It would be a boon to householder and industry, alike.
(That is why TWUA has been working closely with such legislators as Maine’s Senator EDMUND S. MUSKIE and Representative WILLIAM D. HATHAWAY in their all-out battle for this project.
(This article describes the benefits that would flow from the project and warns of the power lobby that threatens its creation.)
President Franklin D. Roosevelt used to say that the right of the people to operate their own electric utility systems acted as a "birch rod in the closet," to keep the private power companies on their toes, and he helped to create a national "birch rod" in the form of the Tennessee Valley. Authority, which transformed a bleak, depressed, and eroded valley into a prosperous industrial center and a recreation wonderland of manmade lakes.
The experiment has been judged a success by almost any standard, and people from all over the world come to the TVA to take lessons on how to manage natural resources for the benefit of the public.
Can a similar effort jog New England’s complacent power companies out of their comfortable rut?
There is a better than even chance that New England will get its"birch rod" in the form of the Dickey-Lincoln School project, authorized by Congress last year for Federal development. That is, if the all-out lobbying campaign now under way by New England power companies does not succeed in chopping $1.2 million from President Johnson’s current budget. This is money needed for advance engineering and design of the project; a necessary next step toward the start of construction. Backers of the St. John River development are confident that once this big block of 794,000 kilowatts of Federal power is injected into New England’s predominantly private power economy, its competitive effect will be felt, as in the Tennessee Valley, by householders and industries alike.
New England is the only region in the country without a single kilowatt of Federal power. It is also a region of extremely high cost electricity, and it can be argued that one follows the other.
The latest report on electric bills published by the Federal Power Commission shows that in 1965 New England’s residential electric users paid the highest average bills in the continental U.S. For example, for 250 kilowatt hours of electricity per month, New Englanders paid $8.57, as compared to the national average of $7.38 and the TVA area’s $5.57.
The spread between New England’s industrial rates and the national average is even greater than the difference at the residential level. A study by the Electric Consumers Information Committee last year put the New England electric rates for industry at 62% more than the national average.
Representative TORBERT H. MACDONALD, Democrat, of Massachusetts, declared in a
House speech that high industrial rates damage his state’s economy. He told of a letter he had received from a New England textile manufacturer who wrote:
"If we expect industry to develop and grow in New England, these power rates must be brought in line with comparable rates charged elsewhere."
He went on to say that his company was "almost forced to consider seriously the feasibility and desirability of remaining" in New England and was in fact "studying the relative merits of several other locations in the south."
Representative MACDONALD, who is a staunch supporter of the Dickey-Lincoln School projects, said that single manufacturer could have saved more than $18,000 in one year in his electric bills, had he been charged at the average national rate. Power bills for the company were 55% higher than they would have been in one southern city and 144% higher than in another.
"Now this is a serious problem for this company, for all manufacturing plants in Massachusetts and for our entire region," he declared. "We do not want to lose our industry. We do not want to see men and women left without jobs. To my colleagues from the South, let me say emphatically that neither do we want your region to raise its electric rates.
"What we in New England want is action to reduce power rates in New England. We can move in this direction by harnessing and developing our water resources."
But New England’s electric utilities are in no mood to allow Federal power to encroach upon their domain.
FDR’s dream of harnessing the tides of Passamaquoddy Bay was successfully labeled a "boondoggle" by the power companies of 1935. In 1937, Roosevelt’s dream for a "little TVA" in the Northeast also went down to defeat.
In the intervening years, Federal power has come to the Pacific northwest, California’s Central. Valley, the huge Missouri Basin in the midwest, the Colorado River drainage, Missouri, Oklahoma and Arkansas, the southeast. New Englanders have charged, on occasion, that Federal power was luring industry away, and only in recent years have serious efforts been made to give New England a "turn at bat" when Federal hydro projects are being passed out.
A young Senator from Massachusetts, John F: Kennedy, expressed interest in reviving the long dormant Passamaquoddy project. After he became President; he asked Interior Secretary Stewart L. UDALL to restudy Quoddy., in conjunction with the development of the rich hydro resources of Maine’s St. John River.
An Interior team found that development of the St. John at the Dickey and Lincoln School sites, with a transmission line to the Boston area, could produce power at costs well under those of the region, could pay far itself, and merited prompt authorization and construction. Quoddy was recommended for further, more detailed study.
Secretary Udall went all-out in support of the St. John project, and he obtained the full backing of President Johnson. The President sent a favorable report on the project to Congress last July, bearing his stamp of approval, and calling for "immediate authorization, funding and. construction of the Dickey and Lincoln School projects on the Saint John River and their associated transmission system."
The Senate voted to authorize the Maine projects, but a battle royal developed in the House. New England utilities "mobilized the private power lobby across the nation to apply pressure to every Congressman, regardless of party" to keep public power out of their region, as Maine’s Senator Edmund S. Muskie, Democrat, described it.
"They are fighting to maintain their monopoly," he charged. "They have made New England the highest cost power region in the nation."
New England newspapers ran editorials attacking the project, often in almost identical language.
Only three of the region’s major dailies -- the Boston Globe, the Providence Journal, and the Portland Press Herald -- stood firm for the St. John River project. The utilities organized a lobbying group called the Electric Coordinating Council of New England which flooded Congress with "fact sheets" and brochures, generally hand delivered by local utility officials, purporting to show that the private utilities could do the same job, only better. But spokesmen for the lobby decline to state how much consumers would have to pay for electricity which they promised to produce so cheaply by their alternative plan.
The companies failed to stop Dickey-Lincoln School in 1965. The project was authorized after a long fight in the House.
This year, however, they are back in force, trying to prevent any money from being appropriated for it. Specifically, President Johnson’s request for $1.2 million in engineering funds is under attack. The historical word "boondoggle" is being heard once more in the halls of Congress, as the House Appropriations Committee considers the President’s budget.
Key man on the subcommittee considering public works funds may be Representative EDWARD P. BOLAND, Democrat of Massachusetts, who opposed the project last year. Another member of the eight man subcommittee is Representative, JOHN FOGARTY, Democrat of Rhode Island, who voted for the final authorizing bill.