Farmers rally against proposed PPL line for Allenwood data center
Farmers in Union and Lycoming counties, Pennsylvania, are formally organizing to protest a proposed high-voltage transmission line by PPL Electric Utilities across their properties. This line is intended to serve a data center complex planned by PNK Group in Allenwood. The Pennsylvania Farm Bureau is supporting the farmers and pushing for an eminent domain reform bill to ensure fair landowner compensation.
Farmers in Union and Lycoming counties, Pennsylvania, are actively protesting a proposed high-voltage transmission line by PPL Electric Utilities that would traverse their agricultural properties. The 230,000-volt line is planned to connect to a data center complex being developed by PNK Group at Great Stream Commons in Allenwood, Union County.
Terry Snoddy, a third-generation Union County farmer, spoke at a Pennsylvania Farm Bureau press conference, highlighting that the proposed line would cut through open fields across Gregg and Washington townships, despite what he claims are existing rights-of-way that could be utilized. Andy Bater, District 6 Director for the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau, joined the farmers to advocate for a separate eminent domain reform bill. This legislation aims to ensure utilities and other condemning authorities provide more complete compensation to landowners when private property is acquired for public use.
Bater noted that the eminent domain bill has unanimously passed the Pennsylvania Senate and is currently awaiting a floor vote in the House. He urged attendees to contact their state legislators in support of the bill, while also pointing out a loophole in the current draft that does not protect preserved farmland from utility transmission line easements.