July 17, 1979
Page 18932
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. BUMPERS). The Senator from Maine (Mr. COHEN) .
Mr. COHEN. I have just about 2 minutes before closing. Just a couple of points, Mr. President. I do not know anywhere in the Record where it has been suggested or stated that the construction of Dickey-Lincoln is going to draw industry into that region of Maine. Industry depends upon base power not peaking power. Nowhere does it appear we are going to have that kind of an attraction going into Northern Maine because of Dickey-Lincoln.
So far as permanent jobs are concerned, there are 68 permanent jobs coming out of Dickey-Lincoln.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield? I want to be sure I heard correctly. This project provides for 45 percent of base power. Is the Senator saying it does not?
Mr. COHEN. No, it provides some. The bulk of it is peaking power which will be distributed out of Maine rather than in Maine.
Mr. MUSKIE. The Lincoln School power is entirely based in that part of Maine.
Mr. COHEN. If that is the base we ought to build just Lincoln School and make it only base power, and that will serve only Maine and, as a matter of fact, that is a proposal being considered right now. Let us build a project paid for by Maine without Federal funds, and built for the people of Maine.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. COHEN. Yes.
Mr. MUSKIE. First, the Rankin Rapids Dam would have been a big dam that would have had the Allagash and St. John and maximized the energy output for whatever purposes you wanted.
But you confront me, I know, with a challenge. You are destroying the environment policy. You reduce energy production and you reduce the output of the Allagash, and now you are saying, "Why don't you maximize by building a dam for maximum base power." I would agree to either.
Mr. COHEN. You support the Lincoln project?
Mr. MUSKIE. Not alone, because it would not utilize the power that is available to us in the St. John River to the maximum extent that the good Lord made it available.
Mr. COHEN. Mr. President, I would like to place this in even further perspective. I would like to place a letter in the RECORD, a letter of Richard E. Barringer, Commissioner of the Department of Conservation of the State of Maine, where he points out when talking about measurable economic benefits of Dickey-Lincoln:
In these respects, the measurable economic benefits of the Dickey-Lincoln project outweigh the costs by about $53 million over the 100-year lifetime of the project. On the average, this amounts to about 50 cents per year for each living Maine resident for the life of the project.
Then he goes on to say :
It does, however, dispel the doubt that Dickey-Lincoln yields no economic benefits to the people of Maine. The benefits of the Dickey-Lincoln Dam — or, alternatively, the cost of keeping the St. John flowing free — amount to about 50 cents a year to each of us.
In this context, Maine's final decision on Dickey-Lincoln remains one of personal values, of affirming what purposes we, as Mainers, want our State and, in particular, the St. John River Valley to serve for the next hundred years.
Finally, it has been suggested that the Speaker of the House speak on behalf of the people of Maine. Well, the president of the Senate of Maine has come out in opposition to the project, so there is a division here.
One of the major papers in the State of Maine, the Maine Sunday Telegram, has come out against Dickey-Lincoln. The editorial concludes:
In short, Dickey-Lincoln asks Maine to make an enormous sacrifice for a meager return. And those few scant benefits simply aren't worth the destruction of the last remaining major wild river in the eastern United States.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter and the editorial be printed in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:
STATE OF MAINE,
DEPARTMENT OF CONSERVATION,
Augusta, Maine, October 13, 1977.
Mr. JOHN ROBINSON,
Chairman, Citizens Dickey-Lincoln Project Impact Review Committee,
University of Maine,
Farmington, Maine.
DEAR JOHN: I am pleased to transmit to you the enclosed report entitled The Economics of Dickey-Lincoln from Maine's Perspective.
The object of this analysis is to compare the direct economic benefits and costs to the people of Maine of the Dickey-Lincoln Dam project. It indicates that the major benefits of the project to Maine would come in the form of reduced electric rates to selected Maine consumers. The major costs will be felt in personal income losses in Maine's forest economy.
In these respects, the measurable economic benefits of the Dickey-Lincoln project outweigh the costs by about $53 million over the 100 year lifetime of the project. On the average, this amounts to about 50 cents per year for each living Maine resident for the life of the project.
One cannot conclude from this finding that the project should be built. The St. John River Valley, itself, has a value which, unlike power values and forestry values, is not reflected in the economic marketplace. That Maine people find substantial value in simply keeping the area undeveloped is, to my mind, certain. The Bigelow Referendum and the recent Anti-Billboard Law indicate that the people of Maine are willing to forego development in order to protect important natural values of the State. Putting a dollar measure on that value has plagued the economics profession for years. At this point it cannot be done satisfactorily.
What one may conclude is that economic analysis of the Dickey-Lincoln project from Maine's perspective does not yield a clear-cut decision on its desirability to our citizens. It does, however, dispel the doubt that Dickey-Lincoln yields no economic benefits to the people of Maine. The benefits of the Dickey-Lincoln Dam — or, alternatively, the cost of keeping the St. John flowing free — amount to about 50 cents a year to each of us.
In this context, Maine's final decision on Dickey-Lincoln remains one of personal values, of affirming what purposes we, as Mainers, want our State and, in particular, the St. John River Valley to serve for the next hundred years.
I hope very much that this report will prove of value to you and the Review Committee as you consider your final recommendation to the Governor.
Sincerely,
RICHARD E. BARRINGER,
Commissioner.
NO TO DICKEY LINCOLN
The Dickey-Lincoln hydroelectric power project on the St. John River in northern Maine should not be built.
We're persuaded that the construction of what has been called the largest public.works project ever proposed in New England would not be in the best interests of either Maine or the nation.
On the one hand, construction of a world class dam at Dickey on a scale rivaling the Aswan Dam in Egypt, the creation of an 88,000-acre reservoir, and the construction of a huge transmission network through the forest lands of western Maine, would result in environmental damage on a scale which cannot be justified.
And, on the other hand, the giant project can barely be justified either on the amount of electricity which it would produce or on the basis of cost projections which are widely believed to be artificially low.
Moreover, if the project is approved by Congress, Maine will be asked to absorb virtually all of the negative aspects of the project in return for a relatively small percentage of the benefits. Maine alone would bear the burden of the massive environmental scars but the bulk of the electricity generated by the dams at Dickey and at Lincoln School would be marketed outside the state.
Our decision to oppose Dickey-Lincoln is not lightly made. We recognize that the demand for electrical energy in Maine and New England is growing rapidly and that peak load demand (the kind Dickey-Lincoln would partially satisfy) is expected to more than double in the region over the next decade. And we are all too painfully aware that New England now must rely on increasingly expensive and scarce petroleum for the generation of approximately three-fourths of all the electricity we consume.
Nonetheless, Dickey-Lincoln extracts far too high a price in terms of economic, social and environmental costs in order to partially meet the region's increasing energy requirements. It would ask Maine and its people to pay far too much in return for far too little.
The chronicle of environmental devastation which would accompany the construction of Dickey-Lincoln is enormous. It would forever destroy 278 miles of free-flowing streams and rivers, flood 30 lakes and ponds, inundate 36,893 acres of deer yards and cut a giant swath through western Maine in order to accommodate high voltage transmission lines. The magnitude of that kind of environmental upheaval would irretrievably alter the character of much of Maine's land mass.
Were Dickey-Lincoln capable of generating truly significant amounts of electrical energy the environmental and societal tradeoffs might be more palatable. But it will not. Dickey-Lincoln's output — even conceding the importance of the peaking power which it would largely generate — would equal only two per cent of all the electricity produced in New England in 1975.
In addition, the cost estimates developed by the Army Corps of Engineers are suspect. The initial price tag of $757.5 million is based on a thoroughly unrealistic 3.25 per cent interest rate. The cost immediately soars to $822.4 million if the prevailing interest rate of nearly 6.5 per cent is used. Finally, the cost estimates are based entirely on March 1977 price levels and do not include any consideration of inflation. Even conservatively projecting the inflation rate between now and 1988 when the project is targeted for completion brings the total price tag into the billion dollar range.
In short, Dickey-Lincoln asks Maine to make an enormous sacrifice for a meager return. And those few scant benefits simply aren't worth the destruction of the last remaining major wild river in the eastern united States.
Mr. STENNIS. Mr. President, the President's budget requested $750,000 for preconstruction planning of the Dickey-Lincoln hydroelectric power and flood control project in Maine. The appropriation bill before the Senate contains that amount. I support the retention of this money in the bill. The Dickey-Lincoln project has been before the Congress for many years. I believe it was first approved by the Senate in 1965. I have voted on it many times. I supported the project on its merits in the past, and I continue to support it.
As we all know, we are facing a national energy problem of tremendous proportions, and we can expect it to be with us for decades to come. The Dickey-Lincoln project will provide very large amounts of power to Maine and the rest of New England. It is clean power, and it uses a renewable resource — water — to generate it. It would take 2 million barrels of oil a year to generate as much power in an oil burning plant, and New England is already too dependent upon oil for energy.
Furthermore the costs of this project are an investment, because Dickey-Lincoln has a favorable benefit-to-cost ratio. The benefits will more than pay the costs over the life of the project. Once it is built it is inflation proof, because it is reliable power, and the water that generates it is not going to go up in price every year.
It seems to me that the situation concerning Dickey-Lincoln is quite similar to what we face nationally. It is time to make some hard choices and get on with them, though they may not suit everyone. This project has been exhaustively studied. Alternatives of one kind or another have been discussed for years, but none of them have materialized.
Here is a project that is known to be feasible. It will replace a lot of oil. It is clean. It will pay for itself. It will create jobs. The Governor of Maine supports it and has so stated in writing. Part of the power will be marketed in Maine, part in the rest of New England. Part of it is intermediate load power, part is peaking power. All of it is very valuable power and all of it makes the region less dependent on oil as an energy source.
Mr. President, in this matter I strongly support the view of the senior Senator from Maine, Mr. MUSKIE, that the preconstruction planning money for Dickey-Lincoln be appropriated for fiscal year 1980. I urge the Senate to approve this appropriation.
Mr. COHEN. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time and I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is all time yielded back?
Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, if I still have the time I yield the remainder of the time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time has been yielded back. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Maine (Mr. COHEN) . The yeas and nays have been ordered, and the clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk called the roll