Thousands of farmers, homeowners, and environmental advocates have packed into fire halls and senior centers this month to oppose a plan they only recently learned about: A proposed $424 million, 70-mile energy transmission line that would run through Baltimore, Carroll and Frederick Counties.

The Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project has been in the works since December, when a New Jersey-based company, PSEG, landed the contract to build the 500-kV line from PJM, which is the regional transmission organization that coordinates the movement of wholesale electricity through all or parts of 13 states, including Maryland.

PJM determined the transmission line was needed both for data centers and regular power needs, said Jason Kalwa, a project director for PSEG. Kalwa identified a planned campus for data centers being developed in Frederick as a potential need. The data center is being developed by Quantum Loophole, which is building out the infrastructure for data center tenants on a 2,000-acre former industrial site.

Data centers power “cloud campuses” that store data; Quantum Frederick would be a beachhead for the industry in Maryland, complementing its base in Northern Virginia.

Despite the project’s scale, almost nobody — not regulators, Maryland legislators, environmental advocates, or residents — knew about it until early July, when word spread like a jolt through neighborhood Facebook groups and Nextdoor.

Among the major concerns: some of the proposed routes run through the area’s drinking water systems, including the Prettyboy Reservoir, and many could compromise productive farmland. But the biggest worries centered on a sentence toward the bottom of the project’s website outlining the possibility of seizing private property for the project. It says: “PSEG may seek to use the power of eminent domain using the process set forth by the state of Maryland to acquire the necessary property rights.”

Local environmental groups, state delegates, and neighbors encouraged one another to show up in force at six neighborhood public listening sessions — two in Hereford, two in Westminster, and two in Brunswick — to share their concerns about the project. The one in Carroll was so crowded that people had to park on the sidewalk and the line snaked around the building. Del. Eric Bouchat, a Republican who represents the area, said he was glad that he took his Harley instead of his car; he got there 20 minutes early, and all the parking places were taken.

“I found out about this two days ago, which is not pleasing. I’ll hold my tongue about what I really think,” he said. “My constituents are very upset. This is not right. This is not how you treat them.”

Bouchat and his constituents were hoping to learn more about the proposed project, but most left the session disappointed. Workers in polo shirts emblazoned with the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project led concerned residents around the room to different stations where they could view maps of the proposed routes and take a survey on which they preferred.

But no one could answer the question that many had on their minds: How could they stop it from happening?

Sheri Heckle, a cancer survivor, said one of the proposed routes would locate lines across the street from her house, and she was concerned about studies showing a link between exposure to electromagnetic fields and cancer. But there was no one to allay her concerns.

“I feel like they’ve already made up their minds,” she said.

The company has no more meetings scheduled; executives said they hope to pick a route by September.

The need for (data) speed

Maryland’s growing power needs stem from an increasing population and new laws that require cleaner energy. Maryland law requires 50% of all power to come from renewable sources by 2030. As a result, many coal-fired and natural gas power plants are being retired, in Maryland and nationally. Yet, the need for energy remains stronger than ever, especially for data centers.

Maryland economic development officials want data centers to relocate to Maryland because they bring many jobs. But they also require a lot of power. This year, the Maryland General Assembly passed a law to make it easier to establish data centers in Maryland, changing the way the state’s Public Service Commission counts back-up generators.

Environmental advocates opposed the measure, arguing that data centers would tax the existing power grid. It passed over their objections, though they did win a promise that 15% of the income tax generated from the data center will go toward climate action. They also won a better public input process for these projects, said Kim Coble, executive director of the League of Conservation Voters. At least, she said, that was what was supposed to happen.

“I don’t know exactly whose responsibility it is, but it does seem that, with a proposal to build transmission lines through three counties, Marylanders deserve better information,” she said.

The usual process

Generally, the Maryland Public Service Commission regulates utility projects in the state. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, regulates interstate transmission of electricity. Neither agency had any information about the Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project and PSEG, because the company has not yet applied for a permit for its project, which is known as a certificate of public conveyance and necessity. After the public meetings, the commission established an email where concerned citizens could send comments. In the event the company applies for a permit to build its project, spokeswoman Tori Leonard said, the comments will be added to the public record.

The five commissioners vote on whether to approve or deny permits. The governor appoints members to five-year terms with state Senate’s role of advise and consent. The commission has one vacancy.

FERC spokeswoman Mary O’Driscoll said she could not comment because the PSEG proposal had not come before the commission. Yet PSEG filed a 197-page petition outlining its expenses for the project and asking the commission to reimburse the company after approval.

Kalwa called the meetings “really just the first step in the process” and said the project is expected to begin delivering power in 2027.

“We’re really excited to see these folks,” he said of the angry crowd. “There’s going to be plenty of opportunity for public feedback. We haven’t filed for a single permit, and there is no guarantee we will get these permits.”

Kalwa acknowledged that data centers were driving demand, but they were not the only driver. And he said power for the project could not flow through existing power lines because they were inadequate.

The project’s costs, Kalwa said, would be split among PJM’s customers, meaning that rates would likely increase.

Those trying to glean what the routes might look like came away frustrated and confused. The project’s website showed 10 possible routes, which together encompassed much of rural Central Maryland. But the information session was like a science fair — attendees walked around to stations with posters and maps.

Alice Volpitta, the Baltimore Harbor Waterkeeper, attended the session in Hereford, and she said it mirrored a trend she is seeing in public information sessions. Instead of a few people at the microphone talking to a group and getting occasionally angry feedback, the organizers divide the room and neutralize organized opposition.

“They are contracting out these meetings to companies that specialize in de-escalation, and they physically divide people, and have them shout into the void,” said Volpitta, who works for Blue Water Baltimore and lives in the area where the project would run. “You can tamp down on the discourse that’s happening in a way that can shut down the conversation. It’s a way to take down control.”

What happens now

Bouchat, the Carroll County delegate, recommended that constituents email Gov. Wes Moore, while promising the delegation would fight to find out more information between now and September, when PSEG expects to announce the final route.

Carter Elliott IV, a spokesman for Moore, said: “The State of Maryland was not involved in the PJM process that resulted in this proposed project, and there is no pending action before the state at this time. Any action that does come before the state will be thoroughly evaluated.”

Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski Jr.’s office issued a statement saying its involvement would be “limited to permitting for construction and development to ensure protection of our environmental resources” should the state grant the permit. Frederick County Executive Jessica Fitzwater, in a statement to The Frederick News-Post, encouraged residents to attend a public session to learn more.

But Carroll County commissioners promised in a press release that the board “will leverage all its influence with our neighboring jurisdictions as well as state and national leaders to halt the project in its current form.”

Meanwhile, some farmers are terrified about losing some of the last, best land in the region, where land conservation protects the water supply even as pressure mounts for more development.

Joyce Curran Holbrook, who lives in northern Baltimore County, said her community is still reeling from power lines foisted on rural landowners decades ago that have marred the landscape. Now, she said, she and her family call the area Mordor, “the once beautiful farmland that has a pall cast over it … no one wants to be near those power lines.”

Even if the routes avoid her home, Holbrook said, “it’s going up next door to me, and it’s going up in communities I know, and it all came up really fast.”

Charlie Bond, another Baltimore County resident who attended the meeting last week, said he and his neighbors are terrified about the possibility of utilities seizing their land under eminent domain law, which allows for such takings when governments declare they serve a public purpose.

“If they take land or impose massive structures with high-voltage electricity that are hazardous, that’s going to have a major impact on farming operations and even just people who have lived on land in the area for generations,” Bond added. ”They’ll start turning Maryland into New Jersey.”

Volpitta has worked with environmentalists who have blocked pipeline projects, if only temporarily. Famously, indigenous tribes, environmentalists and farmers stopped the Dakota Access pipeline, though litigation and environmental studies continue. And Maryland denied a company’s request to drill under state land to build a pipeline through Washington County, only to see the U.S. Supreme Court rule that the company could seize state-owned land to build the pipeline.

Successful community organizing is key and requires diverse coalitions of conservative farmers, indigenous communities, environmentalists and homeowners. A Facebook group, Stop MPRP, already has nearly 8,000 members. She hopes her neighbors can sustain the momentum through what is sure to be a long battle.

“This, right now, this is not true public stakeholder feedback sessions. People’s voices are not really being heard,” she said. “Our job now is to keep that momentum going when these voices are going to matter even more. I don’t want everyone to burn out. I don’t want this to be the last push for people.”

Maryland’s Public Service Commission will accept emailed comments about the project at piedmontcomments.psc@maryland.gov

This story has been updated to clarify that Quantum Loophole is a company developing a campus of data centers in Frederick.