Recent alert came over the wire about a transmission project on BLM land, this one in Wyoming, and yes, that map is fuzzy, no details, and it’s direct from the application on the BLM site, awful!

Here’s the BLM page for the project — a rather short line in the cosmic realm of things — and there’s little info to go on. There’s a 15-day public scoping period prior to preparing an environmental assessment (EA), and comments are open until 4 p.m. on January 7, 2025:

BLM Lucky Star Transmission Page

Per the press release:

For more information, contact the Rawlins Field Office, 307-328-4224. Submit written comments to the Rawlins Field Office, P.O. Box 2407, Rawlins, WY 82301-2407, Attn: Lucky Star Wind Transmission Line Project.

And there are these emails listed on their page, I’d send to these plus snail mail (this is 2024/2025 — comments by snail mail?):

It’s a pretty small project, 24.8 miles:

And the full application, PRELIMINARY application:

And as usual, the maps suck. How can one effectively submit a scoping comment “prior to preparing an environmental assessment (EA)” when there’s this timeline that shows the “Draft EA done 1/6/2024, and the EA was STARTED five days after it was DONE. From TIMELINE PAGE:

And they acknowledge the error and fixed it!!!

GOOD!

Recent alert came over the wire about a transmission project on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land, this one in Wyoming, and it’s to be built “mostly” on BLM transmission corridors. WHAT? Yup, here’s the main page. BLM transmission corridors And yeah, it’s grim. That map above shows how grim it is.

So before I get into Lucky Star Transmission, we need to get familiar with the BLM set up… and there’s a LOT. It’s originating with the “Energy Policy Act of 2005” There’s so much info that the BLM Lucky Star Transmission Project will be the next post. Lots of ground to cover — and they’re sure working on covering it with transmission. Ya wonder why challenging transmission projects feels hopeless, other than minor route changes…

Did you know the feds designated the “West-Wide Energy Corridor, a BLM-designated energy-transmission corridor,” over a decade ago? This is another aspect of the “Energy Policy Act of 2005.”

That Energy Policy Act of 2005 is the law that triggered the coal gasification rush that thankfully was brought to a halt, particularly thanks to everyone of “No New Coal Plants,” challenging every one of them, and helping establish that coal gasification was nothing more than “Pipedreams of Green and Clean,” and that claims of feasible carbon capture and storage was not happening on a level to be even close to a CO2 climate change miracle.

As for CO2… CO2 capture and storage is a recurring nightmare, a red herring that keeps coming back.

It’s so disturbing to see the same ol’ thing coming around, after the intense challenge to the Excelsior Energy Mesaba Project, where Xcel Energy, of course, and our local advocates mncoalgasplant.com(pre 2012 captures) and Citizens Against the Mesaba Project (CAMP)(pre 2012 captures) worked together to tank Micheletti’s boondoggle. At the last minute, Excelsior Energy camp up with a CO2 capture and storage plan, where it would capture a minute percentage of CO2 and then transfer it to the PLANT GATE!Their plan? Read it and guffaw, snort, hoot and holler: Ex_EE1067_Plan for Carbon Capture and Sequestration

From nearly 20 years ago, that was a nightmare I don’t really want to remember: Pipedreams-of-Green-Clean-IGCC The Excelsior Energy Mesaba Project was an all encompassing HUGE project for me and all of us challenging coal gasification, time wise, technically, and the sheer room for all the boxes of crap taking up an entire wall in my office… and OH MY DOG, I missed a lot that grew from that Energy Policy Act of 2005.

The current push for CO2 capture, pipelines, and storage a la Summit Carbon Solutions, is another pipedream/nightmare, proof that “we” don’t learn anything. The Iowa parts of Summit Carbon Solutions pipeline project was APPROVED (!) by the Iowa Utilities Board f/k/a Board of Public Utilities last summer, and the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission recently approved a very short part of Summit’s pipeline, I’d guess a Summit trial balloon for Minnesota, as a much larger pipeline project is proposed for southern Minnesota. Sooooo… we’re off to the races.

And that brings us to the transmission part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors we know about. The original three are now joined by others, also receiving a big push right now by the Biden Administration adding some additional corridors, and dropping others proposed.

But these BLM “energy corridors” are a whole ‘nother kettle of fish. When first established, they were challenged, with Plaintiffs arguing it wasn’t enough, hence a “Settlement Agreement.” Y’all know what I think of “Settlement Agreements” and this one seems no exception — look at all the groups blessing this BLM facilitation of another massive transmission buildout:

Here’s the BLM’s “Regional Report” with links to the documents:

Regional Review Final Report

And the map of the corridors:

Here’s their guidance for siting transmission in these corridors:

Interim Directive 2726.43k – Use of 368 Corridors in Siting Energy Projects

And here’s their study, which supposedly evaluates whether the Section 368 corridors are achieving their
purpose to promote environmentally responsible corridor-siting decisions and to reduce the proliferation of dispersed ROWs crossing Federal lands.

From this, the “priority corridors” map:

Ain’t this just delightful??

On to the Lucky Star Transmission Project

Whew! Got this done early too!

And that noise modeling that is SO off, really, p. 18 & 19, they did this, 0.6 and 1.0 ground factor!!!

Nope, not OK, this needs a do over, resubmit corrected modeling, with notice for public review and comment.

Here’s a post with the primary documents for you to check out and COMMENT ON!

Lava Ridge wind DEIS deadline now 4/20

The deadline for Comments on the Lava Ridge wind project Draft Environmental Impact Statement has been extended to April 20, 2023. This is the wind project near, or nearly surrounding, the Minidoka National Historical Site, depending on the siting allowed.

Want to make a comment? Here’s how:

Here are links, starting with the Executive Summary and in order of appearance (there’s really no easy way to do this, and be prepared, just that first one with the narrative, it’s 578 pages long, and it’s the most important for the overview):

Go to the “Friends of Minidoka” for some guidelines and suggestions for comments:

Friends of Minidoka – Lava Ridge page

As we left our Craters of the Moon Nat’l Monument campsite in Idaho in May…

… and headed southeasterly, on the way to the rather new Minidoka Nat’l Historic Site, Alan discovered that there was a Lava Ridge wind project proposed for the area.

Here’s today’s notice from BLM:

Details:

Thursday, August 25, 2022

9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time

Virtual via Zoom – Zoom Registration

Agenda

The first meeting was on July 7, 2022:

View the recorded meeting here