PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine’s best court on Tuesday breathed new daily life into a $1 billion transmission line that aims to serve as conduit for Canadian hydropower, ruling that a statewide vote rebuking the task was unconstitutional.

The Supreme Judicial Court docket ruled that the retroactive character of the referendum final calendar year violated the project developer’s constitutional legal rights, sending it back to a reduced courtroom for more proceedings.

The court did not rule in a different circumstance that focuses on a lease for a 1-mile part of the proposed electricity line that crosses condition land.

Central Maine Power’s guardian corporation and Hydro Quebec teamed up on the project that would supply up to 1,200 megawatts of Canadian hydropower. That is sufficient electrical energy for 1 million properties.

Most of the proposed 145-mile (233-kilometer) energy transmission line would be constructed alongside current corridors, but a new 53-mile (85-kilometer) part was necessary to reach the Canadian border.

Personnel had been now clearing trees and environment poles when the governor requested for operate to be suspended after the referendum. The Maine Office of Environmental Safety later suspended its permit but that could be reversed dependent on the final result of legal proceedings.

The significant court was asked to weigh in on two different lawsuits. Builders sought to declare the November 2021 referendum unconstitutional while yet another lawsuit targeted on a lease allowing for transmission traces to cross a shorter segment of state-owned land.

Supporters say daring jobs these kinds of as this one particular, funded by ratepayers in Massachusetts, are necessary to fight climate alter and introduce additional electrical power into a location that is intensely reliant on purely natural gasoline, which can result in spikes in energy expenses.

Critics say the project’s environmental gains are overstated — and that it would hurt the woodlands in western Maine.

It was the 2nd time the Supreme Judicial Courtroom was requested to weigh in on a referendum aimed at killing the venture. The very first referendum proposal in no way made it on to the…