Seven local environmental groups have signed onto a letter to the Humboldt County Planning Department demanding changes to a proposed wind farm project that would place dozens of large turbines on two ridgelines south of Rio Dell.
The letter — signed by some of the North Coast’s environmental heavyweights — comes as the the large, San Diego-based renewable energy company Terra-Gen’s wind project is in the final throes of the Environmental Impact Report process. Humboldt County Planning Director John Ford said the final report analyzing the impacts of putting dozens of 600-foot-tall wind turbines on Bear River and Monument ridges released in late October or early November. Ford said he anticipates the Humboldt County Planning Commission will consider certifying the EIR and approving a conditional use permit in November.
Proponents of the project, including the Redwood Coast Energy Authority, which is in the process of trying to negotiate the purchase of the majority of the electricity the project would generate, argue that it is an important step toward reducing Humboldt County’s carbon footprint in the face of the stark and imminent reality of global climate change. But as the draft environmental impact report notes, the project will undoubtedly have sizeable impacts, perhaps most notably on migratory bird species in the area.
The Sept. 12 letter — signed by the Environmental Protection Information Center, Northcoast Environmental Center, Humboldt 350, Friends of the Eel River, North Coast Chapter of the California Native Plant Society, Redwood Region Audubon and the Redwood Chapter of the Sierra Club — interestingly notes that not all its signatories are unified. Some of the organizations want to kill the project outright, the letter says, while others would support a modified version. But if the proposal moves forward, the letter states the groups “unanimously insist” that four conditions be met.
“Our organizations urge rapid action at the local, state, national and international scale to address our climate crisis,” the letter states. “In Humboldt, emissions associated with electricity use account for approximately 13 percent of total county carbon emissions, according to the county’s forthcoming Climate Action Plan. We encourage the development of clean energy projects but recognize that wind energy development can have detrimental impacts to the natural environment. In most circumstances, these impacts can be minimized and mitigated to acceptable levels through sound planning, siting and imposition of the best available technology. Here, as acknowledged in your draft environmental impact report, given the largely undeveloped landscape and the presence of at-risk species, the Humboldt Wind Project will have significant impacts to the environment. At present, these have not been minimized or mitigated to an acceptable level.”
Specifically, the groups “insist” Terra-Gen not erect turbines on Bear River Ridge, noting that it is home to an “isolated and unique” population of horned larks, sits within a designated “important bird area” and is of great cultural significance to the Wiyot Tribe, which has voiced its opposition to seeing the ridge dotted with massive wind turbines.
The groups also want Terra-Gen to complete all survey protocols before the EIR is complete and incorporate “smart design,” which would allow the turbines to stop operation when sensitive species are detected nearby or during “survey-defined high-risk periods.” The group is also calling on Terra-Gen to commit to adaptive management, noting that “we can expect significant technological advances throughout the life of the project (30 years).”
“As technology advances, and our ability to reduce impacts and increase efficiency increases, the project should adopt emerging technologies and adapt to changing conditions,” the letter states, adding that this could help reduce operational impacts as the project ages.
Finally, the letter notes the project will “require significant ground disturbance” — in addition to the placement of dozens of large, concrete bases for the turbines partially buried underground, the project will require the widening of a number of access roads adjacent to sensitive watersheds — saying that such disturbances are “a known cause of sediment pollution and landslides.” Consequently, the group is insisting that all “ground disturbance occur outside the “wet weather period, defined as Oct. 15 to May 15.”
In a statement, Terra-Gen’s project spokesperson Natalynne DeLapp said the company takes environmental protection seriously and, through the county planning department, is working directly with the state Department of Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife on “scientifically defensible strategies to avoid, minimize and mitigate” the project’s environmental impacts.
“The project, as presented to the public in April in the Draft Environmental Impact Report, is evolving through the California Environmental Quality Act process to incorporate many of the comments raised by the public, organizations (such as listed in the letter) and agency feedback,” she wrote. “This evolution of the project development is ongoing, with the Final Environmental Impact Report to be released to the public in the fall.”
The draft environmental impact report essentially set a ceiling for the project — stating the maximum number of turbines — and the company is now working with regulators to find a balance under that ceiling that brings impacts to a level deemed acceptable but also produces enough electricity to keep the project viable.
As proposed in the draft report, the project would see as many as 60 turbines erected on the ridges that, once operational, could produce an estimated 155 megawatts of renewable energy annually, enough to continuously power 40,000 homes and supply 36 percent of the county’s electricity consumption.
If electricity consumption accounts for 13 percent of the county’s carbon emissions, as the environmental groups’ letter states, that means the project could potentially result in a 4.7 percent reduction in Humboldt County’s carbon footprint, though that number ignores the carbon cost of project construction and operation. Those would include thousands of trips by 90-foot trucks, 17 miles of newly paved access roads, a 25-mile clear cut transmission corridor and more than 2 million pounds of carbon fiber for the turbine blades on the construction side, and the annual use of more than 20,000 gallons of oil on the operational side.
Some slammed the project as a “green washing” from a company (Terra-Gen) that’s owned by Energy Capital Partners, a private equity firm with some $19 billion in energy sector holdings that recently announced the acquisition of all Canadian Utilities fossil fuel-based electricty generation assets, which were valued at more than $620 million.
Project proponents, meanwhile, have pointed to its potential economic impact, noting that it is projected to create 300 jobs during construction, followed by 15 permanent ones during operation, and generate $2 million annually in local tax revenue once up and running. But mostly, proponents argue that the environmental impacts of no project are too grave at a time when the sea level is rising, the planet is warming and weather patterns are becoming more extreme. It’s time, they say, for Humboldt County to reduce its carbon footprint and also shoulder the impacts its energy use causes.
While most projects can be judged by weighing their impacts against a benign no-build alternative, DeLapp says this one — proposed in the face of a growing global threat — is different.
During an interview with KMUD earlier this year, DeLapp asked, “What is the environmental impact of more of the same?”
Thadeus Greenson is the Journal’s news editor. He prefers he/him pronouns and can be reached at 442-1400, extension 321, or thad@northcoastjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @thadeusgreenson.
This article appears in Coming Full Circle.
Dear Thadius, I would like to correct some inaccuracies in your piece.
First, no one knows what turbines are being used, so there is no way to know the lubrication requirements. Some turbines have no gearbox, some do, which means oil/lubrication use is not known at this time. If you are referring to oil as a gearbox lubricant, it is not used up by operation. It might need to be replaced and the old oil recycled into new. Even that is unlikely yearly, as the new synthetic oils, like that used in car transmissions, go the life of the car. Your number of 20,000 gallons works out to be 416 gallons per turbine per year. New turbines use 30-50 gallons per gearbox, which your number projects to changing the gearbox oil every 1.5 months, which just isn’t the way it’s done.
1000s of trips of 90′ loads is not true. There are 48 turbines the last time I counted. Each has 3 blades and is between 70-100 meters tall or 6 truck trips of 90′ x 48 turbines = 288 truck trips of 90′, not thousands.
Humboldt county uses approximately 800gWh per year of electricity. The TG project would produce approximately 544gWh per year, or 68% of all our electricity usage.
The wind farm will have a capacity of 155mw which is an instantaneous measurement of power. It will not produce 155 mW annually as that is not an electrical unit of measurement. Watts X Time = Energy.
Energy usage and CO2 emissions to build and install the turbines are totally offset by just 6 months of these turbines in operation. They spend the next 34.5 years producing 0 carbon.
2,000,000 pounds of carbon, you say? Yep that’s a lot. Over the 35 year lifespan of the blades, it is 57,000 pounds a year. How much solid waste did Humboldt county produce in 2017? 140,000,000 pounds.
But as let’s also compare it to how much waste of steel and concrete is left in the ground from thousands of fracking wells? And the miles of associated pipe? What about the 10’s of thousands of miles of pipelines to move all that gas, which we then burn? Or the CO2 it took to make all that steel that will never be recycled?
You forgot to mention that the group of 7 thinks that wind is in its “infancy”. There are over 600 billion watts of wind and 550 billion watts of solar worldwide.
And this anti-renewable energy opinion piece the day before a world climate strike? I support this strike pioneered by the youth to protect their future. I think the group of 7 is on the wrong side of history, the wrong side for Humboldt. It is incredible that we are having to argue with environmentalists about doing something to help reduce the risk of global climate catastrophe.
What would Greta say?
Jay Peltz 25 year renewable energy professional and educator
Hey Jay,
I helped write the letter. I think your characterization of our letter as “anti-renewable” or that we are on the wrong side of history is fairly ungenerous. Our central point is this: there are additional mitigation measures that can reduce operational impacts from this project, and all feasible measures should be implemented. Wind does have considerable impacts to local biodiversity. Thankfully, through operational curtailment during high-risk periods we can reduce impacts by 50-90% while only losing 1-5% of total energy generation. In other words, we can have wind and wildlife; those who posit otherwise offer a false choice.
By “infancy,” I meant that wind energy development has only really ramped up in the last two decades, with the greatest growth in the past decades (largely owing to the fact that wind energy is becoming more cost competitive with other forms of energy production, even before subsidies). (See https://www.awea.org/wind-101/basics-of-wi….) While wind has been in existence for many decades, it is only recently a significant component of our grid mix. As such, there is a growing body of science on how to avoid wildlife impacts with minimal impacts to energy production. (Like the growing body of science exploring “informed” curtailment, where wind farms can use real time wildlife use data to inform whether to stop spinning.)
Best,
Tom Wheeler
Executive Director
EPIC
Thank you for this piece. Good article with good thoughtful responses (so far). It is no secret that I personally am in favor of this project. And I appreciate the constructive response and suggestions from our environmental community as noted in the article. I am surprised, though, the degree with which people see it as whats in it for Humboldt County to the exclusion of the benefit to the world overall. All of nature is based on balance.
Humboldt is isolated, but not from the atmosphere or ocean, and in the long run every little bit helps. Everyone should compare their energy use to how its produced and the cost of each of those methods over time. And then see how they can conserve. And how, as individuals and as a community, our usage can have the least impact on the atmosphere worldwide.
Unfortunately, the Natural Gas/Renewables Industries are aggressively promoting misguided energy production projects, like the Humboldt Wind Energy Project, which will adversely impact our environment, and rarely deliver essential energy production improvements!
While over 10 million people die each year globally from air pollution and energy poverty, our local, state and federal agencies continue to approve projects which benefit wealthy corporations, support unprecedented levels of income disparity, and distract all of us from the urgent conversation we need to have ASAP about how to actually start reducing global Greenhouse Gas Emissions: (based on standard EPA Risk Assessment and the consensus of our Scientific Community).
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/10/fos…,
http://www.who.int/airpollution/en/
https://www.pewinternet.org/interactives/p…