Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG) would like to build a new transmission line spanning a swath of Maryland, deeming it a “critical system enhancement” necessary to avoid severe and widespread reliability issues on the PJM Interconnection grid as soon as 2027.
Some Marylanders in its proposed path don’t quite see it that way.
Just before ringing in the new year, PSEG filed an application for a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity (CPCN) for the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project (MPRP) with the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC). The filing kickstarts the sausage factory assembly line of bureaucracy that PJM hopes cranks out a roughly 70-mile-long, 500,000-volt transmission line meandering through Carroll, Frederick, and Baltimore Counties and connecting Pennsylvania to Virginia.
“This project is needed to preserve grid reliability for Maryland consumers as electricity demand increases and generation resources are retiring both in the state and in the broader PJM region,” explained Paul McGlynn, vice president of planning at PJM. “Transmission overloads this severe can lead to widespread and extreme conditions such as system collapse and blackouts if not addressed.”
McGlynn said the MPRP was selected because it solves the region’s reliability need with the least infrastructure development required, has cost containment in place, and is slated to have a “much stronger” system performance than other alternatives.
While all those things may be true, especially PJM’s admission that it needs more transmission to accommodate skyrocketing data center demand, a vocal contingent of Maryland residents are fighting the project tooth and nail.
Losing the family farm?
Joanne Frederick is the face of Stop MPRP, an opposition group that spawned within 24 hours of the first meeting about the project in July 2024. In an hour-long town hall hosted last week by Sinclair-owned Baltimore television station WBFF, Frederick said she has been mobilizing to “save our land, farms, and homes.”
Among Stop MPRP’s gripes is that the project would require permanent easements on private properties, dotting a stretch of the region’s agricultural land with 140-foot-tall transmission towers. The group argues the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project threatens the region’s food security and by extension, its economy, making farming operations more difficult or even impossible in some areas.
Green Valley Farm in Carroll County is in the path of the project’s proposed route, which is ironic, its caretakers point out, considering the farm has been used to promote Maryland’s preserved agricultural heritage.
“The actual opposite of what it’s supposed to be for,” lamented Amanda Green.
If affected landowners don’t willingly grant MPRP’s necessary easements, some worry eminent domain could be used to seize the land needed.
“The government is going to take your land,” fearmongered Delegate Kathy Szeliga (R-Baltimore County) in the televised town hall. “This is a 10th amendment issue, state’s rights.”
Such an act would be an absolute last resort, however, families all along that 70-mile corridor are worried they’ll lose acres of prime farmland and the revenue associated with it, plus having their view of a once-pristine countryside forever pockmarked by towering transmission lines.
In September 2024, the statewide non-profit Preservation Maryland lent its voice to the chorus opposed to the MPRP. It claims the line would impact numerous irreplaceable heritage sites, hundreds of acres of permanently protected farmland, and locally owned agritourism businesses. The non-profit supports alternative planning via existing rights-of-way that does not include the use of eminent domain.
“Every step, it’s like getting worse,” Green spoke of the project’s progress in one of several vignettes that bookmarked segments of WBFF’s town hall. “The feelings, the thoughts. What are we going to do? How are we going to stop it?”
“You feel kind of helpless,” she added. “I hope the Public Service Commission can help us. I hope they can see that this isn’t okay.”
The PSC is the entity with permission to grant eminent domain, but if the Commission decides to go that route, it can expect some resistance. One landowner at a clamorous recent hearing about the MPRP held up a sign supporting the Second Amendment and threatened to enact his right to bear arms if anyone came for any part of his property.
“This is absolute destruction!” shouted another attendee. “You are tearing up the livelihood of a lot of farmers!”
“What we’re telling you is no! Pick up your toys, hit the pike!” chimed another. “We want to save our farms!”
How does Maryland benefit?
Another chief concern of Stop MPRP is that the proposed transmission project doesn’t seem to benefit Maryland outside of improving overall PJM system reliability. To date, Frederick says she has not seen anything proving the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project will help Marylanders.
In its filing with the PSC, PSEG explains that “large block load additions (data center development) are a significant cause of the increase in load growth activity that has continued rapidly and beyond what PJM originally anticipated.”
Those data centers aren’t being built in Maryland, a state that imports 40% of its electricity due to a lack of enough generation sources. They’re being constructed in Virginia, the hottest pocket for such development in the world.
Accordingly, the MPRP can be perceived as a sort of extension cord running from Pennsylvania to Virginia- one draped across (but not necessarily plugged into) Maryland. That isn’t sitting well with the affected landowners or their elected representatives.
“I will tell you, until six months ago, all I knew about electricity is what I learned in 9th grade,” joked Senator Chris West (R-Baltimore & Carroll Counties). “But when I’ve got thousands of constituents extremely upset, it does focus the attention… And the main thing I’ve learned is that this project provides absolutely no benefit to the state of Maryland.”
“Every single electron coming through this proposed line is going down to Virginia,” added West. “It’s not going to be used in Maryland.”
PSEG hasn’t specified exactly how much power will stay in Maryland; Stop MPRP’s Frederick says the electric company’s message has shifted continually when asked about it.
“When the story keeps changing, that means the first, second, and third story didn’t really work… The bottom line is that this project is unacceptable,” she concluded.
“There’s clearly a lack of trust going around about why we need any of this infrastructure,” noticed Rob Gramlich, president of consulting firm Grid Strategies, who recommends thinking of transmission lines as an interstate highway system.
“Regardless of where a line starts and ends, it does keep up the whole regional power grid, and there are federal decisions here as well,” Gramlich noted.
Frederick would prefer that PJM and PSEG drop the idea of the MPRP entirely and instead focus on grid-enhancing technologies (GETs) and advanced battery energy storage to make the most of existing assets. Gramlich believes the PSC will consider alternatives like those in the process, but the leader of Stop MPRP isn’t optimistic.
“That’s not what PJM does. PJM has one tool, and that’s transmission.”
Will the plan move forward?
The CPCN filed on December 31 starts a lengthy process that ultimately must convince the five members of the Maryland PSC that there’s a fundamental need for the PJM transmission project. PSEG’s application will be sent to seven different state agencies to analyze the impacts of the MPRP, from economics to aesthetics, from historical factors to environmental concerns. Each agency will make a recommendation to the PSC, which will also have its technical staff review the proposal to determine how it supports Maryland’s energy needs.
“Even if everyone thinks this is a great idea, this is actually a fairly long and involved process,” explained Maryland PSC Chair Frederick H. Hoover. “The company is contending that this project is needed, and they have the burden of proof to prove that.”
PSEG would like the transmission line operational by 2027, but Hoover does not believe that is a realistic timeline. He thinks approval will take longer, and expects PJM to find other ways to make ends meet in the interim and avoid blackouts.
“We’re going to take our time and look at this,” he assured, insisting the PSC’s rubber stamp is far from a foregone conclusion. “This is the first step in a long journey.”
The PSC will soon schedule public hearings in the affected area of the proposal, providing another platform for Stop MPRP and other detractors to voice their concerns.
Although Maryland Governor Wes Moore declined to participate in WBFF’s town hall, it’s clear he’s listening to his constituents on this issue.
“Unless there are adjustments, I don’t see a plan moving forward,” said Governor Moore in a previous interview with WBFF. “I have grave concerns with this, and I have had them for a while. I don’t understand how the study area was pulled together without the level of both state and community involvement that was necessary. I’m still not certain what the benefits are to Marylanders, and I’m going to stand with the people on this.”
A fresh legislative session
The Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project is bound to be a hot topic in the state capital of Annapolis, where a new legislative session begins Wednesday, January 8. Maryland faces a projected $3 billion budget shortfall in fiscal year 2026 amid calls for comprehensive energy policy reform.
“We need to get everybody on the same page,” recommends Senator Chris West (R-Baltimore and Carroll Counties). He plans to introduce a bill launching a task force to study the state’s energy usage in the future and directs the PSC to take no action on the MPRP until after the task force has a chance to issue a report and the General Assembly can act on it. The plan would stall the project until May 1, 2026.
State Senate Minority Leader Stephen Hershey (R-Caroline, Cecil, Kent, & Queen Anne’s Counties) expects to see a number of other pieces of legislation pertaining to energy policy, particularly regarding Maryland’s generation shortfall.
“We’re reliant on other states,” Hershey groaned, pointing the finger at his Democratic colleagues for “putting (us) in this position.” He doesn’t see renewable energy playing a large role in fixing that, either, instead banking on more fracking and natural gas development to increase in-state generation.
Delegate Ryan Nawrocki (R-Baltimore County) points out that electricity rates in the region are about to jump at least 25% when previously scheduled retirements of fossil fuel generation assets roll around.
“We have no energy plan in Maryland,” Nawrocki claimed. “When we take the Brandon Shores plant and the Wagner plant offline, we could be importing up to 70% of our power from states like Pennsylvania and we’re patting ourselves on the back in Annapolis like we’re doing something good when all we’re doing is shuffling cards around.”
Some officials, like Delegate Szeliga, would even prefer to keep Brandon Shores and Wagner open.
“Maryland is not generating enough power,” she put it flatly, also turning her nose up at adding renewable generation sources including offshore wind.
Delegate Michele Guyton (D-Baltimore County) says she’s working on legislation to address landowners’ concerns over eminent domain. She also wants to tackle the increasing demand for power to fuel data centers, recommending developers co-locate renewable generation to help offset the strain on the grid.
“I don’t believe this will be the last transmission line that we’ll be dealing with in Maryland,” Guyton predicted. PJM Interconnection’s latest tranche of proposed projects includes several more; It will be formally presented to its Board of Governors in Q1 2025.
“We can set the stage now for how we want to see these things move forward,” she suggested.
Will the General Assembly have more of an appetite for cutting-edge energy policy or for traditional poles and wires, consequences to the locals be damned? Some of the vocal detractors of the MPRP are skipping their state senators and appealing to a higher power… of sorts.
“They’re cramming down our throats while they’re shoving it up our tailpipes,” decried one at a recent meeting. “And the only person that can help us is you, President Trump.”
