BEYOND THE WIRES: Mona to Oquirrh Transmission Line

The Mona to Oquirrh transmission line, a 100-mile project completed in 2013, faced significant opposition from Tooele City due to a lack of early community engagement and a proposed route that threatened a valued viewshed. Despite initial refusals by Rocky Mountain Power (RMP) to reroute, the City used its ownership of a small portion of the land to launch legal challenges, including a temporary restraining order. This forced RMP into negotiations, resulting in a January 2011 settlement where RMP agreed to reroute the line behind the mountains and provide community benefits, including the purchase of 130 acres of open space and a $500,000 contribution to the Skyline Nature Park.

• The Mona to Oquirrh transmission line is a 100-mile 345/500-kilovolt line completed in May 2013 that connects the Clover substation near Mona in Juab County to the Oquirrh substation in Salt Lake County, passing through the Limber substation in Tooele County.
• Local opposition in Tooele City was driven by a lack of early engagement from Rocky Mountain Power (RMP) and a proposed route that would have impacted a valued viewshed from downtown, rather than an inherent opposition to transmission infrastructure.
• Tooele City successfully used its ownership of 4,000 feet of land on the proposed route to initiate legal proceedings, including a temporary restraining order in August 2010, which prevented the Tooele County Planning Commission from issuing a Conditional Use Permit.
• A January 2011 settlement agreement resulted in RMP rerouting the line to south-facing slopes to protect the downtown viewshed, a change that did not require additional federal environmental review as the route had been previously analyzed in the EIS.
• As part of the settlement, RMP provided two direct community benefits: the purchase of 130 acres of undeveloped hillside property to be preserved as open space and a $500,000 contribution toward the development of the 12-acre Skyline Nature Park.
• While the legal disputes caused approximately a year's delay in powering the line, the overall impact on the project's construction timeline was described as negligible, with the line entering service in 2013.
• The conflict served as a turning point for Rocky Mountain Power, leading the utility to alter its protocols for local government interaction and create specific roles dedicated to early engagement with local governments.

APA

Manitius, N., Landau, K., & Harrington, A. (2025). BEYOND THE WIRES: Mona to Oquirrh Transmission Line. Clean Air Task Force. https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/07155339/final-EDF-CATF_MonaOquirrh-Report.pdf

Chicago

Manitius, Natalie, Kelsey Landau, and Annika Harrington. BEYOND THE WIRES: Mona to Oquirrh Transmission Line. Clean Air Task Force, 2025. https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/07155339/final-EDF-CATF_MonaOquirrh-Report.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Manitius |first1=Natalie |last2=Landau |first2=Kelsey |last3=Harrington |first3=Annika |title=BEYOND THE WIRES: Mona to Oquirrh Transmission Line |publisher=Clean Air Task Force |date=November 2025 |url=https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/07155339/final-EDF-CATF_MonaOquirrh-Report.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{manitius2025beyond, author = {Manitius, Natalie and Landau, Kelsey and Harrington, Annika}, title = {{BEYOND THE WIRES: Mona to Oquirrh Transmission Line}}, institution = {Clean Air Task Force}, year = {2025}, month = nov, url = {https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/07155339/final-EDF-CATF_MonaOquirrh-Report.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }