Report Finds IVM Can Be Greener and Less Costly for ROW Management

摘要

A team led by consultant John Goodfellow has developed an economic model to show that integrated vegetation management, or IVM, is both cheaper and greener than simply mowing utility rights of way.When we flick on the lights, we give little thought to the complex network of generating stations and power lines that instantly supplies our reliable supply of energy. In fact, power lines are so common that we often don't notice their presence at all.However, electric transmission rights-of-way (ROWs) cross tens of thousands of miles, cutting through forests and over mountains. Gas and oil pipelines occupy further stretches of ROW. In North America, these corridors occupy as much as 13 million acres, an area larger than Vermont and New Hampshire combined.