as chairman said, my name is joseph welch. i'm chairman, ceo and president of itc holdings, the nation's first and only independent transmission company in the united states being independent means we are not affiliated with any market participant. we have no deal negligence energy transactions. our job is to facilitate the market and to facilitate the interconnection of any sources of generation that are put before us and to make sure that we connect the loads and reliably do so. we own and operate about 15,000 miles of high-voltage lines in iowa, minnesota, illinois, missouri, michigan and our developing regional transmission projects in kansas and oklahoma. as we have worked through these various states. each come to the point we need to build transmission for whatever reason, we've come against a set of obstacles, each one different in every state. probable they is as it should be, but when we get to the outcome of when we want to go in this country, this is going to become a major impediment for us to move forward as a co