Judge allows company to survey route for contentious Maryland power line

The company seeking to build a controversial power line through rural Baltimore, Carroll and Frederick counties can enter the properties of resistant landowners to survey its route, a Maryland judge ruled Friday.

The federal court injunction marks an early win for New Jersey-based Public Service Enterprise Group, the company contracted to build a new transmission line across 67 miles of Central Maryland. The so-called Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project has sparked an uproar among landowners along its route as well as vows by at least one county sheriff to not support the company’s efforts to survey properties.

In a 52-page opinion accompanying the injunction, U.S. District Court Judge Adam B. Abelson said Friday that PSEG showed its project would be delayed significantly at substantial cost if it’s denied access for surveying. He also said he had no reason to question a state office that deemed PSEG’s field evaluations, which the judge described as “minimally invasive,” as in the public interest.

Abelson’s order applies to 91 properties along the project’s route. Under the injunction, PSEG must provide landowners 24 hours’ notice before entering properties and can remain as long as “reasonable necessary” to conducts its surveys.

The proposed Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project, which would cross some 400 properties across the three counties, remains in the early stages of the state’s permitting process. The region’s grid operator, which hired PSEG to build the project, has argued the line needs to be in place by June 2027 to avoid possible blackouts on its multistate system.

PSEG spokesman Bill Smith said Monday that the company continues to negotiate with landowners not named in Monday’s suit.

“We appreciate the Court’s careful consideration of the facts and application of the law in this matter,” he said. “We are currently reviewing the decision for the next steps in the process.”

PSEG applied for a project permit from the Maryland Public Service Commission in December. To proceed with the permit process, Maryland regulators require the company to conduct environmental surveys, work the company has offered property owners one-time payments of $1,000 each to complete.

After meeting resistance from landowners, though, the company turned to the courts in April.

A $424 million project, the Piedmont Reliability line has drawn backlash in part because it would shuttle electricity from Pennsylvania to the doorstep of Northern Virginia, where energy-hungry data centers are putting new strains on the regional power grid.

Joanne Frederick, board president of the opposition group Stop MPRP, sees the surveys as an infringement on landowners’ private property rights, for the benefit of a major company based outside of Maryland.

“If you add it all together, private citizens are being asked to give up the rights to their land to fast-track a project that is almost entirely need to power data centers,” Frederick said.

Sheriffs along the route have said they wouldn’t assist PSEG in its site surveys, a position Carroll County Sheriff James T. DeWees has stood by following Friday’s court order.

DeWees told The Baltimore Sun this weekend that he intended to stand with landowners against the power line “until the bitter end,” though his office was more tempered in a statement to The Banner.

“The Sheriff remains committed to standing by the rights of Carroll County property owners,” the statement said. “He will continue to monitor the results of any court decisions as well as the appeals that will follow.”

While Frederick expressed disappointment in the injunction, she described it as a “bump in the road” in what could become a drawn-out fight between the utility company and property owners.

Opponents will evaluate whether to appeal Abelson’s decision, Frederick said. State regulators at the PSC remain in the early stages of their permitting process for the power line.

Frederick, whose Baltimore County property falls along PSEG’s route, said high tensions over the project worry her.

People on her side feel strongly about control of their land, as does she. But asked about the possibility that sheriffs could defy the ruling, Frederick cautioned that the court’s decision should be taken seriously.

“I certainly wouldn’t encourage anyone to put themselves in a position to be in contempt of a federal court order,” she said.