Yesterday I received the following email from a Fairfax County citizen …

"Mr. Jeffers,

Your site contains more "gobbledygooky Gummint-Speak language" than my tired old brain can handle at this stage. Can you please give me your group's bottom-line REAL answer to what your guys, the state bureaucracy and dominion are all about that us simple folk can understand ... in every-day simplistic terms, please, if you don't mind!"

I replied with the following response …

Thank you for your straight-talk comment about the content of our website. I appreciate your candor. And while I would imagine your brain is neither as “old” nor as “tired” as you claim, you deserve what you have called the ” bottom-line, real answer” to what we’re about.

I’ll try my very best to respond in a way that I hope you feel is plain and clear.

Before I do so, I will say that the issues around how our electricity is generated, distributed and transmitted are complicated. Most of us have very little patience to dig into the subject because it can be a highly technical one. I’ll confess that I took no active interest in the topic of how our state’s dominant utility company operates, until I became involved in this campaign.

As a result of our general disinterest in the subject, we often figure that the “experts” will take care of all these matters. That’s a problem. Our tendency to rely upon the “experts” unfortunately can leave us more vulnerable to proposed approaches that may not be the best ones for our families and our communities.

When I started becoming a little more knowledgeable on Dominion Power's proposal, l discovered quickly that it didn’t take an advanced degree in electrical engineering to understand that something was terribly wrong with what the company was pushing.

It seemed as if Dominion Power was stubbornly bent on just one, single approach to doing things --- and arrogantly dismissed anyone who questioned their methods or motives. And that’s when my own view started taking shape.

I wondered: Had Dominion Power, through its vast political influence and near-monopoly in its home state, simply grown accustomed to always getting its way?

Like others, the more I learned, the more I wondered if Dominion Power was really being straight with us. Things that Dominion Power said didn’t square with what credible voices were indicating elsewhere.

For example:

• In an era when other utilities are looking for ways to burn less coal, Dominion Power proposes to burn more by firing up some of the dirtiest coal-generated power plants in the U.S.

• Although our region has several local sources of modern, reliable and affordable gas-fired energy becoming available soon, Dominion Power says it must build an expensive, old-fashioned transmission corridor line from Ohio River Valley to satisfy our electricity needs.

• While Virginians explore ways to protect some of the Commonwealth’s most precious scenic resources, Dominion Power doesn’t blink at the idea of erecting hundreds of 15-story, industrial scale transmission towers across the state.

• When other utilities are working with commercial customers to control electricity use during periods of peak demand, Dominion Power scoffs at the idea of “demand-side management”.

• While consumers and businesses from across the political spectrum support more conservation, Dominion Power downplays the significant contribution that practical energy efficiency can make today.

• When power companies in other states work with customers and their representatives on responsible policies and solutions, Dominion Power threatens “blackouts” and misleads us with inaccurate information about where the proposed transmission line’s electricity would really be going.

• While Dominion Power’s own documents show that more than 75 percent of the power that would come through the proposed line is going out-of-state, the company has built a slick PR campaign around the fiction that the line is needed for Northern Virginia.

• While industry leaders across the country have been scratching their heads over why Dominion Power ignores any number of more responsible approaches, Dominion Power says flatly “this is the only way”.

I have to say, I don’t get it. Things just don’t add up. Taken together, it has forced me and others to ask of Dominion Power’s proposal: “What’s the benefit to us?”

Just yesterday, the Associated Press reported that West Virginia’s governor, Joe Manchin, posed the very same question. The longest stretch of the entire proposed transmission line would traverse West Virginia, a state which, by the way, would supply much of the coal needed for the project. Still Manchin asked: “Is there an upside?”

The governor said: “At this stage, I cannot be in favor of something unless I see that it has some benefit to our state. I'm still looking to see what the benefits of this project are.”

After a year of listening to Dominion Power say that our “lights will go out” unless they get to build their transmission line, it’s time to tell Dominion Power to be more honest with Virginians about who really benefits from the proposal.

Dominion Power needs to be a better partner with the very customers whom the company is supposed to be serving. In Virginia’s Commitment’s case that our organization will submit to the State Corporation Commission (SCC), we will demonstrate that the proposed transmission line is simply not needed.

What we’re asking citizens like you to do is to urge the SCC to step back, say “no” to Dominion Power’s proposal and encourage Dominion Power to consider the much better ways available to assure Virginians reliable and affordable energy.

What we’re asking of Dominion Power is what you’ve asked: Please be straight with us.