New Mexico Democrat's Ad Signals Shifting Politics On A Clean Energy Controversy
HuffPost
In his new TV ad, Sen. Martin Heinrich embraces a controversial power line project — the sort of thing Democrats used to run away from.
If power lines are the veins of the electrical system, big transmission lines that cross state and national borders are the major arteries ― and they’re notoriously hard to get approved.
In 2021, voters in Maine sided with fossil fuel companies on a referendum to block construction of a transmission line connecting Québec’s hydroelectric system to New England’s gas-burning grid. The next year, New York’s public utility regulator faced fierce opposition to a pair of transmission lines connecting New York City to solar and wind farms upstate and to Quebec’s zero-carbon grid.
Now, building a giant, locally-contested transmission line is something a Democrat is trying to run on.
In a 30-second TV spot released this week, Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) calls the SunZia project — a controversial wind and transmission project, stretching 550 miles from New Mexico to regions in California to Arizona, that struggled for 20 years to get final approvals — “a game changer” that he’s proud to have gotten done.
“Decades in the making, the largest clean energy project in American history, right here in New Mexico,” Heinrich says in the ad. “Some said it was impossible, but I pushed it through. I believe in this country’s ability to build big things again – manufacturing, construction, transmission.”