Building a 195-foot cellphone tower in Northumberland will help bring needed cell service to parts of town and help attract businesses, something that the Northern Pass project won't do with its transmission towers, a planning board member said.

Residents are “wildly in favor of the cell tower because that is going to benefit the town and the people in the area,” member Al Rossetto said. “Northern Pass has no benefit; it's just a liability.”

Northumberland's planning board is expected Wednesday to approve the tower on Morse Mountain; residents at last year's town meeting unanimously rejected the Northern Pass project, he said.

“It's been priority Number 1 to get cell service in town because everyone understands we need this, so you can even come to town to do business,” Rossetto said. “Unless you look for it (the cell tower), you're not going to see it. The Northern Pass is going to be a gash down through the White Mountain (National) Forest and the beauty of New Hampshire for someone else's benefit.”

Northern Pass — a partnership between Northeast Utilities and NSTAR — is a $1.1 billion proposal that would provide up to 1,200 megawatts of electric power from Hydro Quebec to New England. The electricity would travel along more than 180 miles of power lines from the Canadian border at Pittsburg to Deerfield. A previous proposed 180-mile route included 140 miles of existing utility rights of way and a preferred route for 40 miles of new rights of way.

According to the Northern Pass website, the most common new structure height would be from 85 to 90 feet for the right of way in the North Country, from the Canadian border to Groveton, which is part of Northumberland. In the existing right of way between Groveton and Franklin, which currently contains an existing transmission line, the most common structure height would be 80 to 95 feet.

In a call with investment analysts Tuesday, Northeast Utilities is expected to address the question of when a new route will be released publicly for the Northern Pass project, according to Martin Murray, spokesman for Public Service of New Hampshire and Northern Pass.

Northern Pass will transmit the hydropower from Canada to the New England power pool, which supplies electricity to customers in the region, including New Hampshire, according to the Northern Pass website.

For the cell tower project, PSNH, a wholly owned subsidiary of Northeast Utilities, is providing an $81,000 economic development grant to help fund it, according to Scott Tranchemontagne, spokesman for the tower project.

“The overriding point is people could draw some irony for sure,” he said of PSNH helping a town whose residents oppose Northern Pass. “That's not lost on me.”

Murray said the Northern Pass project led to the utility backing the cell tower, which could be operational by spring.

Meanwhile, the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce has come out in support of the Northern Pass project. Its board of directors voted, 19-0, in March to back it, with one abstention and four board members absent.

In announcing its support in an op-ed piece in the New Hampshire Sunday News (See Page B3), the chamber said Northern Pass would reduce energy costs for New Hampshire customers by $20 million to $35 million annually.

“Looking past all the controversy, emotion and rhetoric surrounding this project, it is clear the Northern Pass project will greatly benefit our state's business community,” the op-ed says.

Northern Pass officials made a presentation to the chamber's government affairs committee, said Will Stewart, the chamber's vice president of economic development and advocacy. Project opponents were not invited to provide their side, he said.

“When it was being discussed at both the committee level and at the board level, there were various viewpoints represented and discussed,” said Stewart, who co-wrote the opinion piece.

PSNH is a chamber member but didn't seek out an endorsement, Stewart said. The New Hampshire Union Leader also is a member.

“We took on the merits of the project itself given its vital economic importance to the state,'' he said.

mcousineau@unionleader.com