Legalectric

I’m representing Safe Wind in Freeborn County, and we’re working to increase the setbacks on the Bent Tree project to something that the neighbors can live with, participating in the PUC Certificate of Need and Siting dockets.

Last Thursday, Citizens Utility Board and Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group filed an appeal of the PSC’s Bent Tree decision.

CUB & WIEG Petition for Review and PSC-WI Bent Tree Decision

I’ve posted their pleadings on the Bent Tree dockets in Minnesota.  To review the Bent Tree dockets in Minnesota, go to www.puc.state.mn.us and then click “Search Dockets” and search for dockets 08-573 and/or 07-1425.

Here’s an article about the challenge from the WSJ (Wisconsin State Journal, that is):

More blowback: Suit challenges Alliant wind farm

By Thomas Content of the Journal Sentinel
Aug. 28, 2009

State regulators set a bad precedent for other energy projects when they gave the go-ahead to Alliant Energy Corp. to build a $497 million wind farm in Minnesota, two energy customer groups say.

The groups filed suit in Dane County Circuit Court on Friday to protest the vote by the state Public Service Commission to approve the project under a less rigorous review procedure than is typically required of major energy projects.

The Public Service Commission had used the less stringent review process because the project is an out-of-state project. The commission’s approval is needed for out-of-state project because the agency reviews whether a power plant is cost-effective for utility customers.

“Electric rates have been rapidly rising so we simply can’t afford less stringent regulatory review of new energy projects,” said Todd Stuart, executive director of Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group, in a statement. “The cost and need of energy infrastructure can’t be ignored, especially right now with the massive job losses in Wisconsin.”

Rob Crain, a spokesman for Alliant, said the legal challenge could likely mean delays for the project, which is slated to be operational by 2011, Crain said. The wind farm is needed for the utility to comply with the state’s renewable energy mandate that requires 10% of the state’s electricity to come from wind power and other renewable energy sources by 2015, he said.

“We are surprised and certainly disappointed that WIEG and CUB have chosen to make this filing. We view it as more process over substance,” Crain said.

The commission decided in November to move forward with reviewing the project under a less-stringent standard, a decision that was supported by Commissioners Eric Callisto and Mark Meyer but opposed by commissioner Lauren Azar.

“As far as we were concerned the issue was settled at that point in time,” Crain said.

Charlie Higley, executive director of the Citizens’ Utility Board, said the customer groups couldn’t legally file a legal challenge on the issue until after the commission’s final vote on the project in July. In this summer, the groups had warned  Alliant’s Madison subsidiary, Wisconsin Power & Light Co., that it was proceeding at its own risk by moving forward with the project under the less-strict review.

The groups are concerned about the precedent the commission’s decision could set for other types of energy projects that utilities could seek to build outside the state’s borders, such as a costly nuclear power plant or coal-fired power plant.

“The bottom line is risk for customers,” Higley said. “And the risk is that poorly designed or expensive projects could be approved and forced on to ratepayers who would then pay higher rates than they should be.”

Yeah, he’s got pie on his face, all right… or is it egg…

Alan would put the headline as “PUC HELPS BILL GATES BUILD COAL PLANTS!”

Anyway, the meeting is Tuesday, TOMORROW… and, well, not Bill Gates directly, but his Cascade Investments.   They’re on the PUC agenda tomorrow.   Cascade Investments is providing the $$$ to Otter Tail Power build the Big Stone II coal plant, and without Cascade Investments, the Big Stone II coal plant doesn’t get built.

Here’s the Comment that I just sent in:

Overland Comment on Standstill Agmt – 09-656

Otter Tail Power and Cascade Investments are on the agenda at the PUC, item #5, where they’re asking for approval of a “Standstill Agreement” that would allow them to operate in a way prohibited by state law:

TOMORROW’S PUC AGENDA

PUC Staff Briefing Papers – 8/25/09

Cascade Investments (Bill Gates) is a major investor in Otter Tail Power.  You’d think he’d get that building coal plants is not a good investment these days, but nooooooo, there he goes!  Over 10% of Otter Tail Power and wanting more, apparently!  But wait, Minnesota law limits how investors with over 10% interest and corporations can act:

Minn. Stat. 302A.673

And here’s where it gets interesting.  OES Staff asked what they’re contemplating that would not be possible under Minn. Stat. 302A.673, and they say “business loans.”  But as staff noted, business loans are fine, that’s not an issue, it’s more stock that is an issue!  Yet despite this non-responsive response, Staff recommends the PUC approve OTP’s and Cascade’s agreement.  SAY WHAT??

Otter Tail Power Filing & Standstill Agreement

OES Comment 1

Otter Tail Power Reply

OES Comment 2

PUC Meeting Notice

So tell me, why should OTP get special treatment?  This was an issue that the OES Staff noted was not common, had not even been reviewed before!!!

1)NOTICE SUCKED – look at the service list for OTP’s filing, and PUC Notice

2) OTP is asking for special treatment

3) OES asked questions about why and OTP did not answer them satisfactorily

4)What’s the impact on ratepayers?  On shareholders? (not that PUC can, or should, have any concern about that!)

5) OTP has burden

6) OTP  hasn’t met it

7) Petition should be denied

Makes sense to me…

That’s Ken, hanging out at Lock & Dam #3, and if you look way in the background, over her butt, there’s the Prairie Island plant… this was back when her snout was still black…

UPDATE ON XCEL ENERGY’S PRAIRIE ISLAND NUCLEAR UPRATE & DRY CASK STORAGE DOCKETS

FINAL EIS AVAILABLE HERE

COMMENT UNTIL 8/21/09

Comments on the adequacy of the Final EIS will be accepted until Friday, August, 21, 2009.  Comments should be sent by e-mail or U.S. mail to:

Bill Storm, Project Manager
Minnesota Dept. of Commerce
85 7th Place East, Suite 500
St. Paul, MN 55101-2198

email: bill.storm@state.mn.us

*************************************************

This just in from Kristen Eide-Tollefson, a succinct & concise update on where this docket is at and a “TO DO” list to weigh in on this mess.  I’ve not kept up, though I was invited in to the first Prehearing Conference, I was so frustrated by the two Citizen Advisory Task Force meetings, plus CapX 2020 ramped up, so I crossed that right off my list.  But living with this nuclear reactor (and I get one in Port Penn too, Salem & Hope Creek are right across the river), well, it just won’t go away, SOOOOOOO, here’s what’s up from Kristen:

All:

Here is a link to the official notice for the Final Environmental Impact Statement for Prairie Island.

If you did not get a hardcopy you can:

1. view it on line at the link – FEIS HERE

2. view it at the libraries identified in the link
3. call or e-mail Bill Storm to have a copy sent or picked up. bill.storm@state.mn 651-296-9535,

Good news!

We have an unexpected opportunity to comment on the Final EIS. This was not expected.  But public hearings revealed that the communities felt that the EIS did not adequately reflect the impacts, issues, and concerns that they hoped would be developed in the EIS.  So there will be a comment period!

Comments are due August 21st. They should be sent to bill.storm@state.mn.us

More good news!
1. OES staff has put all non-edit changes in BOLD in the document. This radically reduces the time needed to ‘scan’ for changes that you wish to comment on.

2. A new section has been added — section 3 — which specifically addresses PUBLIC COMMENTS that were received on the draft EIS and in public hearings. This is a major requirement of the final EIS, that it adequately respond to and address public comments.

Comments are due August 21st. You may send any kind of comment about the “adequacy of the EIS”.

Below find 4 key purposes of Environmental Review with some questions that might help you frame or target your comments.

1. Identifying, evaluating potential impacts: Will the EIS be adequate — as a resource and analysis — for decision makers to make these major decisions about:

a. Part 1 – Certificate of need for UPRATE (running the plant with hotter fuel to increase capacity) ,

b. Part 2- Expanding dry cask storage (and extending operations, or relicensing – which is not possible without agreement from MN to store waste on site indefinately)

Does it provide sufficient information and analysis to allow decisionmakers to calculate and balance the cost and benefits of the proposed project, or project alternatives?

2. Response to public comments: Did the OES staff respond adequately to YOUR comments/ public comments/ community concerns — Review part 3 of the Final EIS.

3.  Social/Economic impacts:  Does the Final EIS adequately describe and evaluate social and economic issues and impacts to the communities?   Does it provide sufficient information and analysis to allow decisionmakers to calculate and balance the cost and benefits of the proposed project, or project alternatives?

4. Comparing alternatives: Does the Final EIS adequately describe, evaluate and compare:

a. The impacts of the proposed projects to both natural and socio-economic resources and ecosystems
b. Alternatives to the proposed project
c. (For the legally minded) Compatiblility with state policy and legal precedent

5. Mitigation: Part of an environmental impact statement is to consider what steps could be taken to “mitigate” the natural and socio-economic system impacts of a proposed project — and safeguard important resources. Does the EIS adequately consider  “mitigations”. Does it reflect public/community concerns and suggestions for safeguarding resources and reducing impacts identified in the task force, public hearing and comment processes.

Any Questions about process or content?

Bill Storm wrote Part 1 of the EIS on the uprate
Ray Kirsch is our Public Advisor for OES — He wrote the part of the EIS on dry cask storage. ray.kirsch@state.mn.us 651-296-7588
Mike Kaluzniak is the PUC staff public advisor. “Mike Kaluzniak” <Mike.Kaluzniak@state.mn.us>,
Deborah Pile  is the staff manager 651-297-2375 at OES deborah.pile@state.mn.us
Bob Cupit is PUC staff manager bob.cupit@state.mn.us  651-201-2255

COMMENTS ON THE FINAL EIS

Comments on the adequacy of the Final EIS will be accepted until Friday, August, 21, 2009. Comments should be sent by e-mail or U.S. mail to:

Bill Storm, Project Manager
Minnesota Dept. of Commerce
85 7th Place East, Suite 500
St. Paul, MN 55101-2198
email: bill.storm@state.mn.us

It’s out today, Dan Gunderson at MPR has done an extensive piece on the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission “investigation” of wind turbine noise and health impacts, looking at, per the PUC:

The Commission is gathering information to determine if current permit conditions on setbacks remain appropriate and reasonable.

PUC – Notice WITH SERVICE LIST

Here’s the audio — full text is way below:

What concerns me is that, again, they only gave notice of this docket to the wind industry, and not the people intervening or commenting in PUC wind dockets who raised this issue in the first place, and my comment on that to the PUC, urging them t expand the Notice:

Overland Comments – Request for Broader Distribution of Notice

To see the PUC’s wind turbine setback docket, go to www.puc.state.mn.us, click “eDockets” on lower right, and search for docket 09-845.

And here’s the MPR piece in writing:

Wind turbine noise concerns prompt investigation

by Dan Gunderson, Minnesota Public Radio

August 4, 2009

Valley City, ND — Wind farms are rapidly expanding across the Midwest, and a growing number of residents who live near the wind turbines are complaining about noise.

In Minnesota, those complaints prompted the Public Utilities Commission to investigate.

When Dennis and Cathryn Stillings chose a place to retire, they were looking for solitude and quiet. So a couple of years ago, they bought a farmstead in the rolling hills of eastern North Dakota.

Soon after they moved in, dozens of wind turbines sprouted in a neighbor’s nearby field.

Dennis Stillings said he wasn’t bothered at first because he supported wind energy and he was told the turbines were quiet, no louder than 55 decibels.

“Which is about the same level as your refrigerator running, or the same level as my conversation right now,” Stillings said. “Well, if I was holding a conversation with someone in my living room and someone in the corner was sitting there going bop, bop, bop at 55 decibels, it would drive me nuts and I’d kick him out.”
Larger view
Wind turbines

The Stillings said what bothers them is the pulsating, low-frequency sound. They say it’s like a giant dishwasher, or a helicopter in the distance. Cathryn Stillings said there’s no escaping the sound and that she’s having trouble sleeping.

“It’s a duller sound in the house but it’s still out there,” she said. “You can hear it through the walls. It just kind of gets in your bones.”

The Stillings’ complaints are similar to cases popping up around the country in the past couple of years, as wind farm expansion moves closer to populated areas. Complaints include headaches, dizziness and trouble sleeping.

In Minnesota, a handful of groups have organized to demand tougher regulation. They want the state to require more distance between wind turbines and homes. A report by the Minnesota Department of Health concluded there are potential health concerns.
Read the rest of this entry »

The South Heart North Dakota coal gasification is now going to be an ELECTRIC GENERATION plant.  DUH!  The 800 pound gorilla has just started jumping around the room.  This IGCC plant will be up and ready just in time to use CapX 2020 transmission — DUH!  And if you’re surprised, you’re in the wrong business.

Published August 01 2009

A change in plant plans

What was slated to be a coal gasification plant near South Heart will now produce electricity, a company spokesman said Friday.

By: Jennifer McBride and Beth Wischmeyer, The Dickinson Press

What was slated to be a coal gasification plant near South Heart will now produce electricity, a company spokesman said Friday.

Members of the Industrial Commission of North Dakota continue to support Great Northern Project Development/Allied Syngas Corp.’s ongoing development of the South Heart project. The commissioners prepared a letter of support to Chairman Charles Kerr of GNPD, after discussing the project at their Friday meeting in Bismarck. Commissioners have supported the project and $10 million has been committed to it, along with legislative and technical support, according to the letter.

“The site is ideally located to take advantage of the existing transmission infrastructure and GNPD’s unique access to extensive, low-cost coal reserves,” according to the letter.

The plant will be located four miles south and two miles west of South Heart and will be a

coal-to-hydrogen electrical generation plant.

Rich Voss, Great Northern vice president, said the company asked the commission for support because it is applying for U.S. Department of Energy funding for its plant. Voss said this plant will be more marketable and is a very clean project carbon-wise. He hopes plant construction will begin in 2011 and said permits for the 2 million ton-per-year coal mine are likely to be filed late this year or early next year.

“They originally were going to be a power plant, then a gasification plant then a coal-drying plant, so the next logical attempt will be electricity,” said Mary Hodell, a member of Neighbors United, a citizen-awareness group based out of South Heart. “I don’t know what is left.”

Voss said Great Northern and GTL Energy, a company seeking to operate a coal beneficiation plant also near South Heart, are independent companies.

“We are not working together,” Voss said. “We will use their technology in our plant when they build it and prove that it works, but we won’t use their equipment.”

The cost to build Great Northern’s plant is estimated at $1 billion.

“The county does have a comprehensive plan that is in place to protect the livelihood of the people and it would be nice if that was followed,” Hodell said.

Are we going to let them get away with this?  I love it when my hunches are right, but I hate it when anyone has the audacity to propose something so utterly stupid as this.  It will be hard for them to get it up and running… except who has a power plant application ready to rock (except that it’s a joke, but it takes some time to prove that to the PUC)?  Drat… and here I thought Tom would be down in Honduras trying to build Mesaba down there…