It's.

New clean water regulations are raising questions about the future of hydropower in the state.

Plus, a conservative pack targets climate action in Vermont and the town of Johnson.

And Vermont State University announce an innovative new partnership.

All that and more ahead on Vermont this week.

From the Vermont public studio in Winooski.

This is Vermont this week, made possible in part by the Lintilhac Foundation and Milne Travel.

Here's moderator Mitch Wertlieb.

Thanks so much for joining us.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

It's Friday, September 5t and with us on the panel today we have Kevin McCallum from seven days, Calvin Cutler from Wcax and Austyn Gaffney from Vtdigger.

Thank you all so much for being here.

We're going to dive into some really interesting things about the environment in the show today.

Real deep dive here.

And Kevin, I want to start with you, that big article in seven days that talks about sort of the tension, if you will, between clean energy production and clean water.

And you've got some folks who are all trying to do the right thing on both sides of that equation, but they're not necessarily meshing what in a nutshell, was your article about with these things?

So we knew that there was a big report coming out, which we're going to talk about after this.

I think about the green River reservoir and its future.

And, what we wanted to do was set the stage for people so they understood how in the state of Vermont, the hydro electric energy that we generate from many, many rivers in the state is, often something that regulators are not very fond of when it comes to the fish and the wildlife in those river systems.

Regulators would really like many of those systems to be natural, to not have the on them.

But these dams are important.

They're important for generating electricity in the state.

And so there's this tension, as you say, between those two public benefits.

And there has been, a very high profile example in the green River reservoir of how that tension between those two forces is playing out.

And it's not going very well for the utility that owns that dam.

Where is the green River reservoir?

So the green the green River reservoir is in Hyde Park.

It was built in 194 by the utility in Mooresville.

And they built it, in an effort to make sure they could hold back some water to release water downstream into the Moyle River, where the dams might, like in the drought, were having.

Now, they would try to release water from that dam to flow downstream to the other dams.

Then in the 80s, they added hydropower to that dam.

And so every few decades.

The operators of such dams have to ask the federal government for permission to continue operating that facility.

And so when they were running up to the relicensing of that dam, state regulators came in and said, well, we would like you to use less water from that da when you generate electricity, the fish downstream.

We don't we don't want ther to be too little water in the, in the, in the green River below the dam for the fish.

And we don't really want the level of the reservoir to be going up and down dramatically.

Because that will impact campers.

It'll impact all kinds of wildlife.

And so they they proposed a series of restrictions on the operations of that dam, which the utility said.

Whoa, what are you talking about?

How are we supposed to run a hydro facility if you're not going to let us use enough water to do that?

We can.

Turbines.

They're in place.

They have pipes that come down into the system, and it's all kind of set up for, for us to use in a certain way.

We can't just use a third of that water and generate sufficient electricity.

So they started this very public and years long, what would you call a Calvin?

Sort of, sort of a dance about who what's going to happen next?

Well, legal battle.

Right.

And a legal battle.

Exactly.

Yep.

Went, I believe, went all the way to Vermont Superior Court or Supreme Court.

Right.

It did.

Yeah.

So they've been fighting about this dam for years.

And what we wanted to do was just back up a little bit and say, well, if this is such a huge issue for green River, it's got to be an issue for other dams.

And so that's part of what the reporting was about was let's just see if other hydroelectric facilities in the state of Vermont are, are experiencing similar, similar regulatory pressures.

And it turns out they are friends.

If you talk to Green Mountain Power, if you talk to Washington Electric, co-op and others in the state, they'll say, yeah, like we have been asked by our regulators to use less water in our hydro facility.

And that starts to become a broader problem for the state because we have very aggressive, clean energy goals.

And we've just up to them a couple of years ago in the legislature, and now we've got regulators who are saying, well, you know, we don't want you to generate as much power from those hydro facilities.

Well, that's 57% of the power generated in the state of Vermont.

Wow.

So like if you start if you start turning off the tap to the hydro plants in the state of Vermont, you have a real problem for the state's energy portfolio.

So as you mentioned, they have to, every few years go to the federal government and say, you know, can we keep, operating here?

But the utility that owns the dam is now saying we're done, right?

We don't want to do it anymore.

We can't, because we've asked you time and time again to to loosen the regulations, to let us run it in a more reasonable way, give us more water in the in the winter and give us because they've dramaticall restricted the amount of water that the utility can ru through the dam in the winter.

And I think for years and decades, really, people have been like, man, what's the big deal?

It's winter.

It's up in the middle of nowhere.

There's no campers, there's no kayakers, there's no stand up paddle borders.

But there are animals, there are wildlife, there are loons.

There are so, so, so there is still an impact.

And that' what some environmental groups who are able to make and regulators were able to make a really strong point about.

And so that's what has basically caused this whole conundrum.

And so here we are.

So Mooresville Water and Light says this is a losing proposition.

They can't operate it.

It's falling on their ratepayers.

And they're urging the state saying state legislature and Scott administration, the state need to take ownership of this dam.

That's the only way that they can operate it.

You know, to make money, to, to basically have it be sustainable and you have the Scott administration that's saying we don't want to get into the business of operating another dam.

It would be one of the largest and most complex dams to run.

And so there's that side of it, the governor, this week said that, you know, really they they're not interested in that right now.

But on the flip side of the coin, so what's the other option?

You know, there was a report that said that the dam is in good physical, structural shape.

But, you know, the option that I think a lot of people say should not be on the table and really isn't, but would involve draining the reservoir and decommissioning the dam, which that's that's the end of green River Reservoir State Park.

And as we talked about, this is a huge driver for tourism, the economy, wildlife, canoeing.

I mean, you go there during fall foliage season.

You know, it's absolutely stunning, really nothing like it in New England.

So it's a real it's a rea pickle that we find ourselves.

And there's really no chance, I think that that's going to happen in the short term.

So no one who's thinking about going to green River reservoir or camping there next summer, I think, should be worried that something's going to happen where the dam is going to be removed and the river.

There is a profound public interest from the state of Vermont to keep the dam in place, keep the water levels where they are.

They, you know, people are paddling on canoes with all their camping gear off to an island on the other side of the reservoir.

That all goes away if you drop the water level even about three feet.

So it's just I mean, you could adjust, I think maybe a state park to a lower water level, but what a mess, right?

So nobody wants that to happen.

And this report, that Calvin was referencing that just came out last week was as an effort to sort of lay out all the options for the state, to prevent that from happening.

And, but if the governor.

Sorry to interrupt him, but if the governor doesn't want to have the state bu the dam and take it over, and, you know, all these different groups are vying for for different things here.

What what is the solution?

Does he want them all to get together and come up with a solution?

That's exactly what he said at the press conference yesterday.

Day before yesterday, he said, look, the only way that or the best solution to this problem is for all the parties who have been involved in this fight over the last decade, to come back to the table and figure out a solution that works for everything.

What was interesting, he said, what he wants is that solution to be that power is continued to be generated from that dam, which is directly in opposition to the report that basically said, there's no real way you can run that dam profitably, because one of the options was always, well, maybe the state will take it over and then they'll just find another dam operator who will lease it, and they can run it, and they can sell power to the grid, and they can still make it make a go of it.

And there was always this sense, oh, maybe they'll figure out a way to do that.

This report was like, yeah, that's not going to work.

It's a money loser no matter who's going to try, who's going to want to buy that.

Under the new water quality restrictions that the state has imposed on operations of that dam.

So what I think Scott is hinting at here is why doesn't everybody come back to the table and we'll see if these restrictions are actually necessary.

One more thing I want to point out before we move on to larger issues here, Kevin, is that, you know, a lot of times I read these articles, are fascinated by the reporting you all do.

The writing that you do needs to be acknowledged as well.

And there's a line in here because you went and visited the Green Reservoir Dam and you write, you went down into to look at the structure and you write at one point, this is a tiny concrete structure with metal shutters at the back of the at the back of the dam, it looks like the abandoned home of a deranged hobbit.

Yeah, you did right.

Thank you for that.

I just wanted to acknowledge that.

Thank you.

I really appreciate you're working on that.

Austin Gaffney, I want to turn to you now because, you know, a lot of times during the summer, we have been talking about rain, flooding an all the misery that can bring.

We have an opposite problem.

Now.

We're in a serious drought.

You talk with the state climatologist about this.

What have you been hearing?

So since June, Vermont has been in a short drought.

What?

The state climatologist called, like a flash drought.

So right now, we are in a severe and a moderate drought, depending on what part of the state you're in.

But the entire state itself is in a drought.

But since last fall, we've actually been in a long term drought.

So we have, like, two different droughts going on right now and varying drought going on in different regions.

So it's a complex issue.

But basically a drought comes largely from a lack of rainfall.

So even if we got more rain, like we've seen in like we saw rain in Burlington last night, it's not enough rain to fix the drought.

So the state climatologist told me that basically we would need, depending on where you are in the state, between 6 and 8in of rain over a month.

Well, just to start to replenish, what we've lost in a drought so far, because you need all that rain to kind of filter in through the soil and go into the ground water.

And right now we have a lot of thirsty plants.

So a lot of that water is going to get sucked up by those plants and thirsty cows, too.

As you point out in the article, what are some of the things that this is affecting here?

So it's largely affecting, large farms, larger farms.

So think like, animal operations, like dairies.

If you're a dairy who depends on feeding your cows from your own property.

So from your grass or your corn, a lot of, farmers, so they're aren't able to get a third cut of their hay or they're not able to produce enough corn right now to feed all of their cattle.

So they're having to go to kind of like third parties or to neighbors, and that can really cut into their profits.

Farmers told me it can cost up to $100,000, just to get enough feed for their cattle for the rest of the season.

Wow.

And that affects milk production, too, if the cows aren't getting enough water, right?

Yes, exactly.

So one farmer I spoke to, he's had some of his, well, not totally dry up, but drab enough that he has to supplement with water, from the creek nearby.

So every day he goes once or twice a day to get up to 5000 gallons of water, from his creek.

And he brings that in because, yes, if your cow isn't getting enough water, it's not going to be able to produce enough milk.

You're not going to be able to sell enough milk.

Yeah.

These are huge problems that we're dealing with.

One extreme to the other.

It seems either too much rain, not enough.

I want to talk also about, an articl that you wrote, Austin, about, the Koch brothers.

And, you know, a lot of people may be familiar with these folks, conservative political network that the run, Americans for prosperity.

They have been for years now, trying to fight back against, climate change efforts, mitigation efforts, mostly in red states, but now they're moving into blue states.

What what can you tell us about what they're doing here in Vermont?

Yeah.

So Americans for prosperity was founded by the Koch brothers in 2004.

They're a nationwide organization.

They have a separate PAC called AFP action that kind of like funds, different, politicians, but Americans for prosperity, they call themselves a grassroots organization.

So they're here to, to kind of like, work with volunteers and try to influence policy.

So in 2023, they founded a 50 state strategy.

So it meant instead of just focusing on red states, they're going to focus on the nation as a whole.

So they started to have a presence in traditionally more progressive states like California and Washington and now also Vermont.

So in 2024, they launched their first major campaign, where they spent tens of thousands of dollars on mailers, to kind of push back against what was then known as the Affordable Care Act.

Right.

Kalvin, you've been covering this as well.

How aggressive are they getting now here in Vermont?

Very aggressive.

It seems like no matter where I go online, whether on social media, Facebook or the like, one of those mailers even came to my house in Burlington.

And, there is a very aggressive push, really harping on the pro affordability agenda, you know, in politically, in the last election in Vermont, state House Republicans or Vermonters elected more Republicans per capita, two Vermont State House and Senate seats than anywhere else in the country.

And I think Americans for prosperity and the folks behind you see that momentum.

And they say this is a message that's resonating with Vermonters.

So let's try to get more, GOP candidates elected.

You know, historically, you know, over the last ten plus years, the GOP in Vermont has really struggled with candidate recruitment.

A lot of races, you know, have gone unchallenged against Democrats.

And so they're really trying to use this as an opportunity to try to get more Republicans elected.

And to try to, you know, continue to to, you know, weld their wield their political power at the state House.

It's worth noting Democrats, though, still have the majority i both the House and the Senate.

But, a majority in the Senate, potentially, if John Rogers is reelected as lieutenant governor, he could, cast a tie breaking vote.

Republicans, I believe, need just 2 or 3 more seats in the Senate to have a a governing majority.

You throw maybe if Phil Scott runs again, there's still a lot of questions about who's in, who's out.

You know, politically.

But there's something really fascinating that's happening with Americans for prosperity and the GOP.

And I think this is going to be one of the biggest stories to watch heading into next year's elections.

Is their strategy working?

Yeah, it is right.

I mean, if you talk to any of the Democrats who lost their seats in the last election, they will definitely point to the work of this group as having attacked them in a very, potent and effective way.

Those mailers, I think, have been cited and the criticism of the Clean Heat Standard and Affordable Heat Act, and those things have been cited by many Democrats who lost their seats as sort of the weak spot that they that they were a little exposed on that issue.

And these guys capitalized on that, particularly.

Well, I was after you.

Well, I was going to say I definitely think, AFP capitalized on it, but I think they're still, you know, they're spending tens of thousands of dollars here, but they have hundreds of millions of dollars at their disposal as a national group.

So I think what they've done so far in Vermont, even though it's been influential, it's still been quite small.

And so I think what will be interesting is to see like kind of how they push up that momentum, especially with the summer accountability campaign that they're launching.

And specifically, you know, they haven't funded any politician in Vermont yet that would have to come through their PAC.

So right now, they're really focused on policies and they're really focused on energy policy.

Especially I want to follow up with that, Austin, about, you mentioned a gentleman in your article, Ross Connolly.

He's the sort of the face of this here in Vermont.

Who is he?

What is he doing?

So he's the Northeast regional director.

He is a 34 year old who has been with, AFP for over a decade now.

And he is based in Manchester, New Hampshire.

So he is kind of like leading the effort here in Vermont.

I think you talk to him as well.

Calvin.

And so he is kind of working to, organize here in Vermont, but he doesn't live in Vermont, and neither does anyone else who, is organizing for Vermont in AFP.

For FP.

Yeah.

Go ahead.

I will say also, I mean, after talking with, you know, several Republicans and people sort of that work in campaign finance and politics at the state House.

You know, they contend that this is really the GOP kind of giving Democrat a taste of their own medicine.

You know, over the years, you know, to when we talked about the clean heat standard, to be fair, there was also money that was coming in, outside spending in favor of the Clean Heat standard.

But, so, you know, outside money isn't necessarily new to Vermont politics.

It's just really interesting to see it, you know, come, come in.

First off, this early in on, in this, in the campaign cycle, but also coming in for Republicans in such a pretty strong way.

Yeah.

You know what I found fascinating, though, in your article, Austin, was that as you quote, Ross Connolly here, and this is to Calvin's point, this affordability question.

You were saying this to Kevin.

They're really hammering home like, you know, Vermonters, you're getting hit in your pocketbook with things like the clean heat standard, and it's just going to rais your energy rates, etc., etc.. Connolly is quoted in your article as saying, we're not denying climate change exists.

We're saying the way we're going about it in this state is hurting people, and we should put people first and solve the problem in a more reasonable and moderate way.

Does he say, would that more reasonable and moderate way is, I'd be really interested in hearing your perspective on this, too, Calvin.

But I think his argument is a very like what I say in the story.

It's a very made for Vermont approach.

For decades, AFP has been denying the science behind climate change.

And in Vermont, they're saying, you.

No, we're not saying climate change doesn't exist.

We're just saying, like, what you're doing will not solve climate change in Vermont.

Instead, it's just hurting Vermonters.

I think a lot of people who are on the other side of that argument would say the money that Vermont is going to save in the long term is going to help Vermonters by transitioning to this, rather inevitable clean energy future.

But folks like Connolly are saying this in the short term is hurting Vermonters.

I will say, though, things like the clean heat standard that he points to that was never actually implemented.

So it's never actually been able to hurt a Vermonters pocketbook.

Yeah.

I mean, that's took the words right out of my mouth.

I think, you know, the big two things that Americans for prosperity is looking at, number one, they haven't actually made any solid policy recommendations to to be clear.

But yeah, the removing the private right of action from the Global Warming Solutions Act, something that Governor Phil Scott has advocated for.

That effort fell short this year.

We'll see next year.

But then also they talk about, land use and regulations and of course, that Vermont meaning act 250, maybe more exemptions, changes to that.

You know, that they say potentially could help build more housing and help our affordability challenges.

So that's kind of reading between the lines of where policy wise, Americans for prosperity is heading and what they'll they're sort of throwing their weight behind.

But yeah, we'll have to see exactly what the, what actual policies they are supporting.

And one more question about the affordability argument here.

If Ross Connolly is talking about things being more affordable for Vermonters, the federal government just cut $62.5 million.

That was going to be funding for Vermont solar projects, which Austin was supposed to be helping low income people especially.

Right?

Yeah.

It's part of a $7 billion national, fund through the inflation reduction Act.

And much of that was cut by the federal government in the one big, beautiful bill.

And so Vermont lost $62.5 million that it was promised through that, program.

And Connolly said, you know, we don't agree with subsidized energy, whether that's natural gas or nuclear or solar.

And so he said, you know, we agree with the loss of this program through the bill.

They even celebrated the loss of it, according to your article.

Right.

National group, did the national group, National group celebrated the passage of the bill?

Okay.

I want to get to a more, local story here, Kevin, that you were reporting on the Burlington Electric Department, is going to undergo a, an audit ordered by the Public Utility Commission.

What's happening there?

Well, the Public Utility Commission, made an extraordinary public, filing.

Not that long ago, about a month or so ago, wherein they laid out, 11 different shortcomings that they cited, for, the electric department, Burlington.

And in fact, the phrase they used was troubling pattern of regulatory errors, inconsistencies and shortfalls.

So you never want your regulator to be out there telling the world that this is what they think of your management performance.

And so what they asked what is very unusual?

I mean, regulators normally work behind the scenes and they have conversations with the with the entities that they regulate.

And they say, look this is how you need to do it.

And apparently they've had some of those conversations with with bed Burlington Electric officials in the past.

And the message didn't get through.

I guess.

And so they decided to make a much more public, statement about their dissatisfaction with the way that the utility is operating.

And they asked the Department of Public Service what they thought they should do under these circumstances.

And, the other day the department said, well, if it was up to us what we think you should do is we think you should hire an outside management consulting firm to come in and comb through all the ways that this organization is not performing to, to your satisfaction.

And, and they they made pains to say there's great things about bed.

It operates well, you know, the outages are very rare.

Customers are very happy where the rates are actually reasonable, reasonable in Burlington compared to some other more rural utilities where like, crews have to go out to restore power over snowy mountainsides.

Everything.

Burlington has a very compact, a service area, so rates are reasonably low.

But apparently on the regulatory side, they're just really dropping the ball.

What does that mean specifically?

I guess we'll find out with the audit if it happens.

Yeah.

We're going to have to wait for the auditors to get in there and route around.

They did hav they did have several examples that they cited that were problems.

One of them was one that we reported on, which was about $1 million, that the utility, lost out on, by it's kind of complicated, but they basically failed to accurately, document the fact that they generate renewable energy.

When you document that you make renewable energy, you can then go and sell that credit to someone else who really wants to say that they generate renewable energy or use renewable energy.

That's a profit center for Burlington.

And they flubbed it.

They missed a deadline.

And so they they lost out and their partners lost out on that money, too.

That was kind of a hig profile example of a screw up.

I think the regulators saw that.

I think it came at the tail end of a bunch of other screw ups that were more minor and not as newsworthy, and they said, that's it.

We got to get somebody in there and figure out what.

And as you say, this is pretty unusual for for this kind of thing to happen.

Anyway, I want to move on to, I think what sounds like a potentially really nice story here.

And, Calvin, you've reported on this, Vermont State University is teaming up with the town of Johnson for a service partnership.

What kind of things are you going to share here?

Yeah, I mean, Johnso still is in the thick of flood recovery, as are many communities.

And just up the hill in Johnson, there's, Johnson State University, or it used to be now it's part of, Vermont State University.

About a third of buildings on campus are empty because of, you know, declining enrollment, but also just switching majors and programs around.

And so there's this new partnership that's developing between VSU and the town of Johnson to relocate the health clinic, some municipal office offices, the post office up the hill to Johnson getting out of the floodplain, restoring, you know, areas in the downtow to try to get more water flow.

Is is the ultimate goal, but try to also bring more people up the hill to spend time at the college.

So there's really this partnership that's, that's being formed between the two.

And they're really seeing this as, as a model that, you know, other communities in Vermont or even college towns across the US that have been dealin with declining, post-secondary education enrollment over the last ten, 20 years.

They see this as a formula that that other, states might be able to look to.

So we're still quite a ways out from from this going.

There's going to be some public hearings on it, public information, sessions.

But, you know, it' one piece of the Johnson flood recovery mosaic that I think there's a lot of people in town that that are pretty excited for it.

Yeah.

And you know, Johnson is is certainly making a name for itself.

You know, they physically move their library.

You know, it was really an incredible thing that we saw on this program.

We saw some video of that.

So they're taking steps now.

Again I think this partnership makes some sense because it can really help both parties here in a lot of ways.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that's ultimately the goal here.

Right.

It's to try to revitalize Johnson and sort of how can we think about living with the river and making our community more flood resilient?

You know, we know that a lot of our downtowns are built in the floodplain.

We use water in channels for for power, waste, you know, all types of, of reasons.

And so this i sort of the next iteration of, you know, how can we utilize our assets up the hill and, you know, try to revitalize town.

So it's it's pretty exciting, actually.

Now, I appreciate the update on that one last thing before we go, our colleague and friend Kevin McCallum here works for seven days, of course, and the independent weekly newspaper is turning 30.

This have 33 decades of reporting here in Vermont.

So we did want to acknowledge that.

And congratulations, Kevin, for, being a part of that team at seven days.

And that's going to have to do it for Vermont this week.

I want to thank our panel, Kevin McCallum from seven days, Calvin Cutler from and Austyn Gaffney from Vtdigger.

Thank you all so much for being here.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb but I hope you join us again next week as well for Vermont this week.

In the meantime, have a great week.

Thanks.

And.