(The Center Square) – Tri Cities residents who’ve been fighting a massive wind farm project are expected to pack a community meeting Thursday, ahead of a potential final vote.
The Washington state Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, or EFSEC, has spent three years studying the proposal before recommending to Gov. Jay Inslee approval of the Horse Heaven Clean Energy Center, with major restrictions to protect endangered ferruginous hawks and tribal interests.
The EFSEC recommendation was to basically halve the project in size and scope, but Inslee challenged the scaled back plan and EFSEC is reportedly ready to endorse the governor’s wishes.
“He ignored EFSEC and the local concerns and the tribe’s concerns, as if he’s the emperor,” said Rep. Mary Dye, R-Pomeroy, in a Wednesday interview with The Center Square.
“He feels emboldened in ways I don’t understand,” Dye continued. “At the beginning when the decision came forward from EFSEC, we were heartened because they did take into account the concerns of the local community.”
The draft recommendations Inslee asked the council to consider would drop the mandatory exclusion area for turbines around ferruginous hawk nests from 2 miles to a limit of 0.6 miles.
Inslee told EFSEC that the 2-mile restrictions were “overbroad” and argued there is no evidence of hawk nests in the impacted region in the last five years.
“These windmills are much taller than the Space Needle [about 500 feet] and because the viewsheds are so vast in eastern Washington, you can crest the summit from Ellensburg and see Horse Heaven Hills from there,” Dye said.
“They are out of state developers who will sell to an equity firm out of the country and the entire process will have no meaningful labor increase because they bring them in to build and that land after the renewable energy fad is gone.”
Scout Clean Energy, the project developer, has not made public exactly where the turbines would be put, but the draft recommendation would ban any turbines from being built within a mile of Webber Canyon, southeast of Benton City.
The Yakama Nation has identified Webber Canyon as an area of particular traditional cultural property, or TCP, concern.
The Center Square reached out to the Governor’s Office for comment and received a response from spokesperson Mike Faulk, which read in part: “EFSEC is an independent entity. The governor cannot ‘force’ them to do anything. The process is straightforward. EFSEC sent a proposal, the governor sent it back with his opinion, and now EFSEC is preparing to respond. The governor can then accept or reject EFSEC’s proposal. He cannot revise it.”
The EFSEC board includes a chairperson appointed by the governor and representatives from the Washington state Departments of Commerce, Ecology, Fish & Wildlife, and Natural Resources, as well as a representative from the state Utilities and Transportation Commission.
Thursday’s 3 p.m. public meeting will not include public comments. However, written comments were allowed up until August 25.
The meeting can be viewed on TVW.
