The controversial transmission line called the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project, that would cut through Northern Baltimore County, would come close to the Prettyboy Reservoir.
While officials say the project would not threaten the Baltimore area’s drinking water which comes from Prettyboy, environmentalists remain concerned.
Baltimore City owns the reservoir although it is in Baltimore County.
According to a statement from the Baltimore City Department of Public Works, the MPRP “does not appear to present a contamination risk” although the proposed route is within the Prettyboy Reservoir’s watershed drainage area.
“As with any major construction project impacting Baltimore’s reservoir watersheds, the Department of Public Works will closely monitor for potential impacts, including increased sedimentation or nutrient loading in the tributaries feeding our reservoirs,” according to the statement from DPW.
John Canoles, an environmental consultant who is working with the group Stop MPRP, said the project’s construction would increase sediment in the reservoir which in the short term would reduce its capacity.
Cannoles added it would wipe out more than 50 acres of forests in the Prettyboy watershed which he said is a “well established, large forest community that provides a fairly unique habitat for this area.”
He said numerous birds live there, including red shouldered hawks, barred owls, and pileated woodpeckers.
Gussie Maguire, Maryland staff scientist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, said that the trees that would have to be cut down in the Prettyboy watershed to make way for the MPRP would impact the reservoir. She said the forests act like a sponge.
“They soak up excess runoff,” Maguire said. “They soak up the nutrients that come along with that runoff and any pollutants.”
The Prettyboy Reservoir holds about 20 billion gallons of fresh water, according to the DPW. It feeds water when needed to the Loch Raven Reservoir. which supplies the Montebello Water Filtration plant in Baltimore City.
Maguire said if the 70 mile transmission line, which would run through Baltimore, Carroll and Frederick Counties is going to be built, then it needs to set an example of what an environmentally responsible project should look like.
“We know that this is not the last of these projects, it’s just the first one,” Maguire said. “There will certainly be additional changes to electrical infrastructure.”
According to a report released Friday by the CBF, more than 500 acres of protected land would be threatened by the project.
At a November 12 public hearing in Hunt Valley Jason Kalwa, the project manager for PSEG, which would build the transmission line, said they took the environment and other issues into account when they chose that particular route.
“Based on the data that we have, the input that we have, that was the least impactful route, Kalwa said.
Maryland’s Public Service Commission will decide whether the MPRP is built.
