Sparks Fly Over Proposed Ameren Powerline Routes

Kathi Duly and her husband did everything they could to look in the crystal ball and predict the future when they moved to a new subdivision off of Highway 79 in St. Paul.

“We wanted a little more of a rural feeling,” Duly says. “We bought in the back of a subdivision, where it backs up to a farm—which we realized they could sell for another subdivision. But there’s a creek back there, there’s a tree line there. So even if they build homes, we would still have a nice tree line along the creek.”

Duly now worries those careful considerations could be for naught, if the Ameren Corporation decides to relocate high-voltage transmission lines to run across her backyard as part of a project to increase how much electricity the provider can carry. 

“If this would go in, they would probably remove all the tree line,” she says. “We stayed away from where the current transmission lines are … and now they talk about moving them.”

Duly was one of dozens of St. Charles County property owners who came to several Ameren open houses in June to discuss a future project to replace, and possibly relocate, a corridor of transmission lines and towers running through north and east St. Charles County. Ameren also hopes to build a new high-capacity substation in the eastern part of the county.

“This project is about transmission capacity expansion, increasing reliability of the transmission system,” says Ameren project manager Jim Jontry. He says Ameren is one of many power providers in the Midwest upgrading their lines to move more electricity around the interstate electric grid.

Environmental concerns

In eastern St. Charles County, on Highway H about 4 miles east of New Town, the plan to build a substation has nearby homeowners worried.

Doug Bauer, who lives about a mile away, says his experience from decades in soil grading and wetland management tells him the soil at the substation site is all river sand, extremely permeable to any sort of oil or chemical contamination from the electrical equipment leaching into the groundwater that feeds nearby wells.

“There’s ample ways to design around that, through either synthetic liners or through clay,” Bauer says. “I feel like that hasn’t been addressed.”

Sonya Dwiggins, who owns a farm with her husband next to the proposed substation site, fears their home’s private well will be contaminated the same way as St. Charles City wells near another Ameren substation. That cleanup went on for years and required the city to buy water from St. Louis.

Dave and Sonya Dwiggins

“Our well was dug two years ago, and it is approximately 28 feet deep,” says Dwiggins. “We do not have the luxury of buying our water from anywhere. If our water is contaminated, then we are S.O.L.”

She is concerned that if Ameren raises soil elevation for the substation, it could divert water toward her property in a flood, and she’s asking whether the electric field from high-voltage powerlines may cause a health risk for her husband, Dave, by potentially interfering with his pacemaker. He’s consulting with a cardiologist about that question after Ameren engineers couldn’t answer with certainty, Dwiggins says.

The Ameren team is following up on these concerns, and will have measures in place to prevent environmental impacts, says spokesperson Evan Asher.

“We have contingency plans in place for nearly any situation, and we have people, including environmental response teams, available 24 hours a day to respond to substations if needed,” Asher says. “This facility will have a spill prevention, control, and countermeasure plan in place.”

He adds that Ameren will follow all requirements for building in the floodplain, and that transmission lines will not cause safety risks for people with pacemakers.

“All our transmission lines are designed to rigorous standards. If a resident has specific questions about electric and magnetic fields (EMFs), we encourage them to please contact our project team so we can provide more detailed answers,” Asher says. “A third-party EMF expert was also present at our open houses in June to speak with residents.”

Ameren’s website provides further information about EMF, including statements that multiple scientific organizations have found no evidence of negative health impacts, and that modern pacemakers are built with protection from EMF interference.

Conflicting feedback on relocation

Elsewhere on the project route, along Highway 79 in St. Paul, there’s a dilemma of a different sort: The existing transmission line route doesn’t fully meet Ameren’s needs, and local landowners are giving competing feedback on where rerouted lines should go.

Ameren, for its part, wants a wider easement to build and maintain new, taller transmission towers. The company currently has a 100-foot-wide path, and it wants 150. In undeveloped areas, that’s easy enough to get. 

Existing Ameren Transmission powerlines in St. Paul

But in recent years, neighborhood builders along Highway 79 have been putting up houses directly next to Ameren’s easement, with a few backyard fences nearly touching the poles. That makes it hard to expand the easement, leading Ameren to consider shifting the route in several places.

There are several options for how and where the lines could be rerouted. But any shift would either run the new towers across rows of backyards, or out onto the Mississippi River floodplain on the east side of Highway 79.

Subdivision residents in the area want the transmission lines to go east, through farmland where few people will be affected. 

John Powers is building a home in a new subdivision near Highway 79 and Highway Y. Ameren’s current transmission route already goes through the unfinished neighborhood, but he’s worried about the company trying to expand its easement on people’s properties, or rerouting nearby.

“Why would you go through a sensitive area with a lot of residents, when you can find a route, especially along Highway 79, that would be out in agriculture fields that have quite a few less property owners and no impact on the value of people’s property?” Powers asked.

Conservationists, meanwhile, want the lines to stay on the west side of Highway 79 because the floodplain is an important habitat for migratory waterfowl and other wildlife. Advocacy group Great Rivers Habitat Alliance argues that power lines would create the risk of lethal collisions along the Mississippi Flyway, where millions of migratory birds travel north and south with the seasons.

Jontry, the project manager, says Ameren responded to that feedback by eliminating route proposals which would have stretched much farther east toward the river. Other options still on the map stay closer to Highway 79, but swing into the floodplain to go around several developed areas.

Jontry says his team will use all the public input they’re gathering to select a route that makes the most sense, then submit that plan for approval to the Missouri Public Service Commission in August. 

“The feedback is really great, and we appreciate everybody who showed up,” Jontry says.

The Public Service Commission will eventually accept public comments on Ameren’s proposed route, although a timeline for that hasn’t been set. Ameren hopes to start construction in 2028 and finish by 2032.