Central Maine Power Co. hires licensed crews to spray government-approved herbicide along its right-of-ways and around its substations to keep vegetation under control.

While we understand the concern about using herbicide, it is practical under the circumstances.

Months ago, the company alerted its customers that it may be spraying Accord, an herbicide manufactured by DuPont and approved for use by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as part of its ongoing vegetation-management program. The alert was sent in monthly bills and may have been overlooked by consumers. That anyone is upset now, however, that the spraying is going on is not the power company’s burden.

CMP is spraying the herbicide for good reason.

If vegetation is not controlled, trees will eventually interfere with power lines. In bad weather, as during the ice storm of 1998, the branches can pull down lines and create massive and lasting outages.

Herbicide is the most cost-effective, least labor-intensive method of managing vegetation, and CMP is lawfully applying the herbicide within accepted government guidelines. The company is also being careful to target nuisance vegetation and leaving everything else alone.

That’s not acceptable to the Natural Resources Council of Maine.

A spokesman there has suggested CMP cut or hand-pull each poplar seedling on its land instead of employing Accord. That’s unworkable. The man-hours that it would take to accomplish this would drive up the cost of electricity to unbearable levels and, then, customers would not be complaining about spraying, they would be complaining about the cost of electricity.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, Maine is consuming an ever-increasing amount of kilowatt-hours, with residential, commercial and industrial electricity sales all higher in 2004 than in the previous two years, with commercial sales making the largest leap. We absorbed a 17 percent hike in electricity costs in March, which the state’s Public Utilities Commission said reflected added costs to produce power. There is now a proposal by ISO New England for manufacturers to receive bonuses to build more power plants, which could jack electricity prices another 26 percent in the next five years.

It took Maine more than five years to retire its $30 million debt from the ice storm, and Maine’s forests still reflect the massive damage from downed trees.

CMP is acting responsibly to keep costs under control by anticipating and eradicating nuisance trees.

In its criticism of CMP’s use of herbicide, NRCM cast doubt that the company can control where the spray travels. That it sprays “assuming the person doing the job is well-trained and targeting and spraying the right plants,” and suggesting these assumptions don’t always hold up in the real world.

Couldn’t that be said of any company or organization?

Don’t airlines assume that pilots are well-trained to do their jobs? Don’t municipalities assume that of police department? Hospitals of doctors? Why hold CMP to a different standard?

If CMP hires the right people to do the right work, it is fair for the company to have faith that the work will be done right.