Open house Monday on planned transmission line

Clean Line Energy Partners will hold an informational open house Monday in Central City on the segment of its planned transmsision line that will cross Linn County.

The Rock Island Clean Line will transmit electricity from wind farms in northwest Iowa and nearby portions of surrounding states to the Chicago area.

The open house will be held from 5 p.m. to 7 pm. at Central City High School, 400 Barber St., Central City. Spokeswoman Bruceann Phillips said Clean Line staff will show the corridor through Linn County from which a transmission line route will be selected, and obtain feedback.

Clean Line Energy Partners is working to determine a route based on an extensive combination of feedback from the public government agencies and non-governmental organizations, as well as environmental and engineering data, the company said in a prepared statement. A public open house was held in Anamosa on Monday, June 6, as part of an ongoing series of public input sessions.

The $1.7 billion million, 500-mile long transmission line will deliver up to 3,500 megawatts of power from Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota to communities and businesses in Illinois and eastern states.

A lack of transmission capacity has limited the number of new wind farms that can be developed. Officials of Houston-based Clean Line Partners say the addition of the line will enable additional wind energy investments totaling about $7 billion.