BANGOR DAILY NEWS • January 17, 2021
Just after Central Maine Power’s parent company said it had received the final key permit for its hydropower corridor and started construction, a federal appeals court ruled Friday that the company could not start work on the last 53 miles of the project from The Forks to the Canadian border. Three environmental groups, the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Council of Maine and the Appalachian Club, filed for a preliminary injunction last November, just after the Army Corps of Engineers approved a key permit for the 145-mile project, which aims to bring hydropower from the Canadian border to Lewiston. That request was denied by a federal judge in December. The group won in a Boston-based U.S. Court of Appeals. Judges granted a request to stop CMP from cutting trees in the 53-mile segment that comprises the final portion of the hydropower line.