Critics tally MEA protest ballots

June 8, 2007

By RUSSELL STIGALL/Frontiersman

PALMER - Some Mat-Su residents just don't want a coal-fired generator in their Valley.

Activist groups, MEA Ratepayers Alliance and Utility Watch gave these disgruntled residents a voice in Matanuska Electric Association's recent advisory vote. The vote asked member-owners to rank five sites where the co-op might locate its proposed 200 megawatts of new electric generation.

At a folding table in the Colony Inn in Palmer, Jim Sykes opened and counted the protest ballots with volunteers Helen Woodings, Tony Pippel, John Abshire and Priscilla Horner with her mother and aunt.

Utility Watch has received 269 ballots at the writing of this article. Of that 263 wrote in either no coal, nowhere, or explore other options, Sykes said. Four voted to place MEA's generation system at the South gravel pit at Mile 37 of the Glenn Highway. Two had not been opened yet.

Sykes said the 270 ballots represented a larger number of disgruntled Valley residents and he said he is pleased with the response.

&#8220People had to go to quite a bit of work to get us a ballot,” Sykes said.

MEA asks its member-owners to advise them on where to place the generators, but they did not ask the main question, Sykes said.

&#8220Which is ‘do we want a coal plant at all,'” Sykes said.

Sykes said his group and MEA Ratepayers Alliance will photocopy the ballots to present to MEA at a public meeting the organizations will host on June 20. The Ratepayers Alliance will also unveil the finished report by independent Utility Consultant Mark Foster, Principal of Mark A. Foster and Associates. The report contends that MEA and its consultant CH2M Hill underestimated the cost to build and operate a coal-fired power plant in Alaska. The result of MEA's suspect plan, Foster said, could cost member-owners hundreds of millions of dollars extra over the plant's 30 to 50 year life-cycle.

The meeting will feature speakers and information on coal combustion and renewable energy for concerned Valley residents, Sykes said. It will be a venue for knowledge not currently available to many in the Mat-Su.

&#8220You don't just have to listen to spin from MEA,” Sykes said.

Utility Watch's protest ballots will not be counted in MEA's advisory vote.