or should that be damn debate? Delmarva Now, Conowingo Dam relicensed for 50 years, settlement agreement with Md. finalized
A federal commission has granted the Conowingo Dam's operator a new 50-year license to continue producing hydropwer in a case activists say will have a profound impact on states' ability to regulate water pollution nationwide.
The approval by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Thursday represents a ratification of a controversial settlement agreement between the state of Maryland and the Exelon Corp., which provides power to about 10 million customers in Maryland, Delaware, D.C., Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Illinois.
The 90-year-old Conowingo Dam is located about 10 miles from where the mouth of the Susquehanna River opens to the Chesapeake Bay.
The Susquehanna funnels pollution that originates on farms, in urban areas, in mines and at wastewater treatment plants southward to the bay.
The settlement is "controversial" because Maryland didn't wring as much money or as many concessions out of Exelon as CBF and the EPA thought they deserved.
I, for one, think that the environmental community has shown far too little gratitude to the builder of the damn, and it's owners, for sequestering pollution coming down the Susquehanna into the Bay for the past 90 or so years.
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