Video: Company Behind Potential Wind Energy Line Needs More Time

COLUMBUS, Miss. (WCBI) – Mississippi’s Northern District Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley gave an update Monday to WCBI on the potential Texas-to-Alabama wind energy line which could cross portions of the Golden Triangle.

Southern Cross Transmission , the company behind it, needs more time to submit its proposal. Presley said that could come by late December or early next year.

He wants the company to look at using Mississippi contractors and he wants residents to benefit from the energy.

He says the company will definitely put the largest asset in the Caledonia area…

“If there had been any consideration of moving the biggest part of this investment, the actual converter station which is valued at $300 million, if any talk of that had been to move that to Alabama, then that would be a major problem with me,” Presley said Monday.

Southern Cross has not picked a final route. It would be spending $700 million in Mississippi alone if the state approves the proposal.

Southern Cross is a subsidiary of the San Francisco-based alternate energy company Pattern Energy Development. The plan calls for a 200-mile wind energy transmission line across Louisiana and Mississippi. The line would end in Vernon, Alabama.

The company is considering routes that would pass through Oktibbeha, Lowndes and Clay counties. The overall project would be a 400-mile transmission line to connect wind energy from Texas to customers in the Southeast.

WCBI has reported residents’ concerns regarding potential eminent domain, decrease in property values and restriction of further land development, among other issues.

Presley has said previously that the project would bring 300 temporary construction jobs, 25 permanent jobs and a $300 million taxable facility in Lowndes County where the transmission line will plug into a power grid in Caledonia.