AltaLink's wallet soothes landowners
The Edmonton Journal has reported that landowners along a planned high-voltage direct current line have been "soothed" by talk of increased compensation. The lines will run between 50-metre high towers, and AltaLink, the utility company, is offering to pay an annual fee to landowners of $1,178 for each tower on cultivated land and $471 for each tower on uncultivated land.
There is an additional lump sum to be paid for the 55-metre wide right-of-way (contrast this with the fairly standard 18-20 metre wide easement for oil and gas pipelines) along with a crop loss payment, entry fee payment and a $10,000 bonus for signing the easement.
However, the final route for the line has not yet been decided and an application to the Alberta Utilities Commission won't be made until later in 2010 or early in 2011.
What do you think about the proposed compensation? Although AltaLink's Vice-President is cited in the article as saying that a 240-kV tower would previously have brought only $150 to $200 compensation, for the size of the easement taken and the impact, visual and otherwise, of a major transmission line and towers through a farm, the annual payment seems unremarkable - at least when compared with similar payments for oil and gas wells and other above ground oil and gas facilities.
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