Solar Site Debate Continues

The BrightSource Energy Company and various environmental groups continue to contest the impact that the proposed Ivanpah solar site will have on Mojave Desert wilderness. A cursory review of BrightSource's testimony to the California Energy Commission (CEC) argues that the designated location for the solar plant is not listed as premium Desert Tortoise habitat. This claim likely rests on dated information from much broader territory surveys and ignores the biological surveys conducted on the designated site over the past year, which have in fact identified significant biological resources, including at least 25 desert tortoises.

In the testimony, Brightsource proposes several major revisions to the proposed compliance measures, which the CEC proposed in order to better protect the natural resources that belong to the public during construction and operation of the site. BrightSource proposes eliminating the BLM as a certifying official in some of the biological compliance standards set forth by the CEC. Instead of the BLM, which has local staff that are more attuned to the resources and conditions at the site, the company proposes that the Sacramento-based Compliance Project Manager (CPM) certify most compliance efforts. The revisions proposed by the company weaken the BLM's role and leave it with nothing more than "review and comment" duties. Questions of biological resources on BLM land should be addressed by BLM, and thus compliance measures should also be determined and certified by BLM.

A review of the company's proposed revisions also appear to weaken the CEC's proposed Desert Tortoise habitat mitigation plan, as well as proposals to preserve very rare plant species located on the site, to include the Mojave Milkweed.

You can find the company's documents posted on this site ("Applicant's Testimony"), as well as responses posted by environmental groups at this site.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How Many Plants Species in the Desert?

Would you expect that California's desert hosts gives the redwood forest a run for its money when it comes to plant biodiversity?  It's easy to take the desert for granted when all you want to do is zoom through it on the highway and get to your destination. But you are passing by an amazing and biologically diverse ecosystem.  There are at least 2,450 native plant species found in California's desert, according to a great article by Chris Clarke on desert life , posted at KCET. If you want to learn more about our amazing deserts, join Desert Biodiversity, a new organization dedicated to exploring, respecting and defending the deserts.
Read more

Mowing Vegetation as Mitigation: Trump Administration Practice Goes Unchallenged

Image
The Trump administration is again touting the practice of mowing thousands of acres of desert vegetation as environmentally-responsible, despite a preponderance of evidence to the contrary.  The draft environmental review of the Yellow Pine Solar project in southern Nevada claims that vegetation mowing - as opposed to bulldozing - will yield positive outcomes that are highly doubtful.   This positive framing of the construction practice misleads the public and decisionmakers and ignores decades of scientific research regarding the impacts of mechanized disturbance on desert wildlands.  According to the draft environmental review: "Mowing is becoming the standard on large site-type ROWs to prevent permanent impairment of public lands (as mandated by FLPMA) and in lieu of off-site mitigation... Mowing methods are designed to help preserve soils, biological soil crusts, soil seed banks, native perennial vegetation diversity and structure, and cacti and yucca species, and t...
Read more

Unlikely Allies: Trump Administration Joins Enviros to Plan Solar Project on Prime Tortoise Habitat

Image
The Trump Administration this month released an assessment that concludes that a solar developer can crush and mow vegetation across several square miles of prime desert tortoise habitat, and still consider those lands as viable habitat for the species.  The silence of some national-level environmental groups regarding the unconventional and unscientific conclusion appears to signal their comfort taking risks with a species already facing significant peril, as well as these groups' inability to champion more sustainable locations to generate clean energy in Nevada. The biological opinion released by the Trump Administration constitutes the official position of the Fish and Wildlife Service regarding the impacts of the proposed Gemini Solar project; its curious willingness to declare heavily disturbed lands as viable tortoise habitat was necessary for the project's approval because the project would be built on lands that have been identified as a vital habitat linkage sustai...
Read more