Cultural history claims versus power-grid needs in Cherokee Co.

A potential Tennessee Valley Authority power transmission line running from the Hiwassee River in Tennessee through North Carolina’s far southwest may impact archaeological sites through the heart of the ancestral Cherokee homeland.

The 27-mile single-circuit transmission line will cut a 100-foot-wide right-of-way from the Appalachia Hydro Plant in Reliance, Tennessee, to a connection with a transfer station on US 74 southwest of Murphy, North Carolina. 

TVA said the new power line is needed to meet increasing demand for electricity.   

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“The proposed improvements create additional capacity, reduce constraints, and increase operational flexibility,” TVA spokesman Scott Fiedler said.  

But according to Cherokee County resident Robert Garland, TVA hasn’t fully assessed the impact on archaeological sites, such as Native American burials, cultural items and relics. 

His property is within the preferred right-of-way of the power line on land purchased by his grandfather in the mid-1940s where Garland was raised. He thinks the land contains Indigenous burial sites and other significant cultural resources. 

The property is the subject of a federal condemnation case. In December 2025, the court granted TVA a temporary right of entry to his property to begin evaluating the preferred transmission line route.

“I’m not trying to block the project, I just want them to know what’s going away,” said Garland, who says he is a Cherokee descendant, though not an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians.  “From my perspective, TVA chose federal condemnation instead of working through a clear preservation protocol to help ensure transparency before culturally sensitive evidence is lost.”

Power to the people

Authorized by Congress in 1933 the TVA is the nation’s sixth-largest power supplier and largest public utility. Its mandate during the Great Depression was to provide electricity, control flooding and erosion, and encourage industrial and economic development. Among the hydroelectric dams built by TVA in Western North Carolina are three on the Hiwassee River, including the Apalachia Dam which opened in 1943 and is 100 miles west of Asheville near the North Carolina-Tennessee border. 

The TVA provides power to 10 million people throughout the Tennessee Valley in seven states from 32 hydroelectric plants, as well as electricity generated by coal, nuclear, and renewables along 16,400 miles of transmission lines.

Cherokee County, the state’s westernmost county, is served by Blue Ridge Mountain Electric Membership Corporation, the Murphy Electric Power Board and Tri-State Electric Membership Corporation. Each distributes power purchased from TVA.

Fiedler said Cherokee County relies on a single loop of high-voltage line. In 2023, a squirrel caused the system to fail for nearly an hour. An alternative power source to reroute electricity during an unexpected outage or during maintenance wasn’t available.

The project, he said, “will improve operational flexibility and redundancy to help prevent outages. A new line and switching station relieve major constraints, allow safe maintenance windows, and significantly improve reliability and resiliency.” 

TVA said the region it serves is growing, leading to a surge in energy use driven by residential growth, data centers, industry and the electrification of transportation. 

“We’ve had very stable to declining demand for electricity for decades (in the TVA service region),” said retired West Virginia University energy economist Stratford Douglas, due to improvements in energy efficiency in industry, and from household goods, such as appliances and lighting.

“Then suddenly with data centers, everybody’s looking at big increases in demand.”

Cherokee County is the site of one new data center. A former 250,000-square-foot textile plant in Marble, 8 miles east of Murphy, is now a 104-megawatt capacity data center operated by Core-Scientific, which requires electricity to cool servers and storage drives. 

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation, a nonprofit regulatory authority, assesses the reliability of the US bulk power system and forecasts a 25% increase in peak demand by 2035, the fastest predicted rate of growth since it began tracking data in 1995.

Their January 2026 long-term reliability assessment found that a lag in the development of power and transmission infrastructure won’t keep pace with escalating demand forecasts over the next decade for electricity in several regions of the nation, including the Carolinas. 

Transmission lines, Douglas said, provide interconnection to ensure that system operators, such as TVA, can draw power at the lowest possible cost when they need it.

“When the interconnections are stronger, the system is less likely to go down,” he said. “A stable system is in everybody’s interest.” 

Cultural artifacts 

The proposed transmission right-of-way would cut along the edge of Garland’s property. As a boy, he recalled watching his grandfather plow soil with a mule, turning up chipped arrowheads and other small human-made cultural objects.

“That really piqued my interest,” said Garland, 70. He estimates that his collection of indigenous artifacts gathered on his property and throughout the county exceeds 12,000 items.

Next to the field tilled by his grandfather, are two marked graves of settlers in a forested area that may date to the 1830s. Garland thinks there are also unmarked Indigenous burials throughout his property. The two marked graves are registered with the NC Office of State Archaeology.

In 2023 Garland received notice that TVA would conduct an inspection of his land for the proposed transmission line right-of-way on his property. Garland denied access. Last year, TVA began purchasing easements from landowners. The agency can acquire private property in the name of the United States for authorized public purposes. Property owners are entitled to just compensation. 

“Before projects move forward, TVA conducts field surveys, cultural‑resource evaluations, and routing analysis to avoid and minimize impacts wherever possible,” Fiedler said. “TVA also engages directly with affected landowners, local officials and federally recognized tribes early in the (National Environmental Policy Act) process to identify potential cultural impacts and ensure proper consultation.”

As a federal agency, the National Environmental Policy Act requires TVA to consider the impacts of its actions on the human environment before making a decision.  As part of that process, TVA must complete either an environmental assessment or an environmental impact statement. 

A viable route

In December 2025 TVA received temporary access to Garland’s property from federal court.

Fiedler told CPP the agency is still in the review process to determine a viable route that minimizes property owner impact. He added that TVA employees have met with Garland at his property on several occasions.

However, Garland said, “There has not been any kind of archaeology assessment done of this property.” 

In June, Garland filed a motion in federal court asking TVA to preserve physical evidence and prevent any ground disturbing, clearing or grading on the property.

In addition, he is asking TVA to participate in a court-supervised walkthrough with the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians or other preservation officials. 

In North Carolina, the property owner and condemning authority are required to attend a mediated settlement conference before trial. Garland said court-ordered mediation with the TVA concluded without an agreement. 

Garland and the TVA can continue to negotiate. Without an agreement, the case will proceed to a jury trial.

“If this corridor contains gravesites or other cultural-resource evidence, then the public, the tribes, and the court need to know that evidence is being preserved before further disturbance occurs,” he said. 

“I am not asking anyone to take my word for it. I am asking that qualified archaeology, tribal, historic-preservation, and environmental professionals be allowed to inspect and document the area.”

Fiedler said the TVA follows all federal requirements under NEPA and Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, which requires federal agencies to evaluate project effects on historic properties.

An amendment to the act in 1992 created a Tribal Historic Preservation Office, known as THPO, in each federal recognized tribe. Federal agencies must consult with THPO during the development of a project. 

“TVA is committed to avoiding, minimizing, or mitigating impacts to historical, cultural, and archaeological resources,” Fiedler said.

What archaeological items might be there?

Warren Wilson College archaeologist Scotti Norman said the ancestral territory of the Cherokee is massive and filled with artifacts and human remains. 

“It’s the product of what people did here over the last 10,000 years,” she said. The archaeological record may include settlements, camps, trails, resource-use areas, burials and other culturally significant places.  

If there is evidence of burials, projects are paused until human remains are confirmed and relocated in consultation with the tribe or community. However, Norman said “there’s a long history of removing physical remains and using them as objects of study,” which for many Native American communities is “physically and spiritually harmful to ancestors and to contemporary communities because the burials were intended to be the final resting place.”

In 1990 Congress passed the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, requiring federal agencies and institutions receiving federal funds to return Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred items and cultural patrimony to lineal descendants and culturally affiliated tribes. 

NAGPRA provides protection on federal or tribal lands. On state or private land, discoveries or excavations are governed by local or state law, although removed human remains or cultural items on private land may require repatriation.

The legislation is designed to encourage dialogue between tribes and federal agencies about protecting artifacts and graves and give tribes greater control over how ancestral lands are used. 

Eastern Band tribal historic preservation officer and archaeologist Beau Carroll said that, although the Qualla Boundary in Swain and Jackson counties “is our present land base, our connections and responsibilities don’t stop at that boundary. These are still Cherokee places connected to living Cherokee people, our ancestors, history and identity.”

The 55,000-acre Qualla Boundary is the cultural and economic hub of the Eastern Band, which is a sovereign nation with more than 15,000 enrolled members. 

Some 5,575 acres of Cherokee territory is also scattered throughout Cherokee County, well to the southwest of the Qualla Boundary, as well as in ancient mounds and historical settlements along the Hiwassee and Valley rivers on public and private land.  

Carroll has not examined Garland’s property and is waiting for additional information from TVA.

TVA said a formal consultation letter will be issued after cultural-resource reports and survey findings are finalized.

“TVA obviously has a long history in the Cherokee ancestral homeland, and its past projects have had significant impacts,” Carroll said. “That history matters, but I also don’t want to assume that this project is going to have the same impact before we have finished reviewing it.” 

The goal of his office, Carroll said, is to do “meaningful consultation early enough that it can actually affect the project” by identifying and avoiding cultural resources.

According to the project timeline, construction begins in 2028 and the transmission line is expected to be in service the following year.

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