$25M JCP&L Project To Upgrade Montville Power Lines

About 50 people came out to the two informational meetings JCP&L hosted on its Montville-Whippany Reinforcement Project. The preliminary cost estimate of the project is $25 million and should be in service by June 2017.

The project will add new structures to an existing seven mile transmission corridor and build a new 230 kV transmission (power) line between the existing Montville Substation to the Whippany Substation in East Hanover. The current power lines have 34.5 kV.

Carl Patterson of Pine Brook Fire Department said the project did not affect him personally, but he was there to see how it affected the community.

“One of the things I was concerned about was where (the route) goes through the residential communities, especially the Pine Brook section of Montville Township as far as fire safety and fire response is necessary,” he said, adding that Superstorm Sandy left many in the community without power and he wanted to know how JCP&L “would beef up the system … It actually looks like a good deal” and the environmental impact “seems minimal.”

JCP&L set up several tables at the Holiday Inn in Parsippany for different topics such as engineering and construction and environment and there were plenty of JCP&L representatives on hand to answer resident questions.

Patterson added that some residents may be concerned with the increased voltage of the new system or the poles that are going in, but “it should not be a concern” adding that the concern is “because this is so new.”

JCP&L also divided the route up into 11 sections and had large close-ups of each section to show exactly which properties the route would affect with a number and description of each affected property lot. On the map close ups, the yellow line represents the PSE&G’s existing route and the black solid line is the preferred route, which already is an existing corridor. The dotted black line is the alternate route, which does not have an existing corridor and would need to be constructed if needed.

The two sections that have a possible alternate route is through Parsippany. Of the 105 numbered property lots affected by the project:

• Residential: 41
• Vacant: 24
• Public: 19
• Other Exempt: 7
• Commercial: 4
• n/a: 4
• Industrial: 2
• Public School Property: 2
• Farm Regular: 1
• Farm Qualified: 1

“This was very informative because the poles that are going up now, I thought came from JCP&L … The poles we see in construction today are for public service. It’s a whole separate service,” said Lake Parsippany resident Mary Purzycki.

The proposed route for the power line goes through parts of East Hanover, Parsippany and Montville to enhance service reliability, add redundancy to JCP&L's system and meet the growing demand for electricity in the region, according to a JCP&L release.

The preferred route parallels existing power lines and in the northern third of the route (between Old Chainbridge Road to the Montville substation), no new right-of-ways are being considered. However, in the middle section and southern third of the route, the right-of-way may be widened.

The southern section of the route runs from Route 46 to the Whippany substation. Also, in the middle section of the route (between Old Chainbridge Road and Route 46), two alternate routes may be required. JCP&L set up the routes “to minimize overall impacts on human and environmental resources.”

JCP&L will seek at least a 100-foot easement for the proposed power line. The project will upgrade the existing substations in Montville and Whippany, which should not require additional land.

For the environmental aspect, they plan to minimize impacts to natural heritage rare species, natural communities, wetlands, transition areas, streams, regulated floodplains and national register listed or eligible resource. Through Troy Meadows, there is already an easement but it may need to be widened.

JCP&L said that in the past decade, the demand for electricity in the State has grown three times faster than the population due to an increased use in electronics and appliances.

Construction will create about 100 construction jobs. Construction may include: tree trimming/clearing for adequate safety clearance, temporary access road construction, staging of materials, equipment, structures and power lines, removal of existing structures and installation of new power structures and lines.

Timeline

• First quarter of 2014: File project petition the NJ Board of Public Utilities (BPU)
• Third quarter of 2014: Transmission Line Engineering
• first quarter of 2015: Get Temporary Access Rights for Construction
• June 2015: File a permit application with NJDEP
• September 2016: Clearing and Line construction will begin
• PJM Interconnection requires that this project be built and has requested that the project be in service by June 1, 2017.

This project is part of JCP&L’s LITE (Local Infrastructure and Transmission Enhancement) program, a $200 million, multi-year comprehensive reliability plan, which started in 2011

If you couldn’t make it to the meetings, you can also contact transmissionprojects@firstenergycorp.com or 1-800-589-2837 or go to https://www.firstenergycorp.com/about/transmission_projects.html for more information.