Opposition to Xcel's Plan for Substation and High Voltage Power Lines bordering Savannah Neighborhood, Plymouth MN

The residents of the Savannah neighborhood and other affected neighborhoods believe Xcel Energy has failed to provide just cause for the addition of a Substation and High-Voltage power lines in the Pomerleau Lake region. There has been a lack of transparency in planning and a significant amount of information and quantitative data is missing from the posted engineering report. We are also concerned that a full and complete risk assessment, both as to environmental and human impacts, was not performed. The substation and power lines will negatively impact area neighborhoods both in aesthetics but more importantly with a negative impact on our property values.

Xcel Energy appears to be rushing to present a plan without fully and adequately considering the impacts on Plymouth residents, particularly as it concerns environmental and economic impacts. Certainly, Xcel as it did with the ill-fated Hollydale Project appears to be rushing headlong into a decision without supplying adequate information supporting their proposals of three alternatives (A, B, and C). Data is also not provided to show why the twelve other alternatives were ruled out.

By way of example, the engineering report fails to answer the following questions:

1) The posted Xcel report does not provide details or comparisons for how the proposed plans will improve power reliability;

2) The posted Xcel report identifies the Transmission Area of Concern but does not adequately explain why distribution and substation upgrades and modification cannot be made within this area versus impacting communities outside of the Transmission Area of Concern;

3) The posted Xcel report does not provide detailed maps showing the path of power lines (which side of the road) and specific positioning of substations. Indeed, when asked by the Savannah HOA, Xcel representatives stated that these plans and the concurrent costs are not yet available;

4) The posted Xcel report does not provide environmental risk or wetland impact assessments;

5) The posted Xcel report does not adequately provide results of details from public outreach reports to area residents or surveys and responses regarding their thoughts and the impacts;

6) The posted Xcel report fails to provide sufficient sub component detail for each option and does not provide confidence levels associated with far term projections, skewing the implied option comparisons;

7) The posted Xcel report fails to supply sufficient responses to concerns raised by landowners, parties and other stakeholders about Hollydale preferred routs and plans that resulted in termination of the proposed project;

8) The posted Xcel report fails to explain why our neighborhood should shoulder the burden for power generated to western Plymouth developments and that there are no alternative options in the area of need;

9) The posted Xcel report does not explain why one or more of the 7 substations in the Transmission Area of Concern cannot be upgraded or modified to meet distribution needs and improve margin for overload conditions instead of building a new substation approximately 1500 feet from an existing substation;

10) The posted Xcel report does not provide a comparison of performance between adding a capacitor bank to the Gleason Lake Substation and Parkers Lake Substation vs building a new substation approximately 1500 feet from the existing Plymouth Substation;

11) Page 47 of the posted Xcel report incorrectly asserts that Option C is the only option that supports re-energizing the Hollydale 69kv line but it is clear that Opt B also allows this the line to be energized using the existing Plymouth Substation;

12) The possible solutions identified in Section 6.4.2 in the posted Xcel report are not sufficiently addressed in the proposed options and does not compare and contrast the the options of creating load transfers at Parks Lake vs building a new substation approximately 1500 feet from an existing substation;

13) The posted Xcel report does not provide sufficient detail for the impact of transferring distribution to 34.5 kV facilities;

14) Section 7.2 of the posted Xcel report only mentions three solutions to the demand issues however the summary states 15 options were identified. Please provide comparisons and selection criteria for down selecting from the 15 options.

15) Figure 1.2, Evaluation and Comparison of System Alternatives, fails to illustrate impacts of building a substation in close proximity to a prized Plymouth wetland, park and playground.

16) The posted Xcel report does not include discussion about long term plans for use of the substation, including whether there are future plans to implement additional distribution lines along Schmidlt Lake Road and/or Fernbrook?