Wind turbines seen on April 16, 2019, South Kennewick, Washington. Credit: Bob Braody/The Tri-City Herald via AP, file
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee has approved a revised plan for a proposed massive wind farm after rejecting a sharply watered-down version earlier this year.
Inslee urged that officials be allowed to act quickly to allow the construction of as many Horse Heaven Wind Farm turbines as possible, The Seattle Times reported. He said Washington state would not meet its “urgent clean energy needs” if officials took years to license turbines.
the The original project was worth $1.7 billion It included up to 222 wind turbines across 24 miles (38.6 km) of foothills in the Tri-Cities area of ​​eastern Washington and three solar panels covering an area of ​​up to 8.5 square miles (22 square km).
But then the Washington Energy Facilities Site Evaluation Board, a clearinghouse for permits required by large projects, recommended cutting the proposal in half because nests of endangered ferruginous hawks had been found in the area. She wanted to create a 2-mile (3.2 km) buffer zone around each nest.
Most of the nests were empty, but the hawks could return to them years later.
In May, Inslee rejected the council’s recommendation to scale back the project, prompting the commission to propose a compromise that would examine the turbines and nests on a case-by-case basis. Under that plan, which Inslee formally approved on October 18, a technical advisory group will recommend whether individual nest setbacks will be reduced to 1 kilometer (0.6 mi).
This could allow the developer, Boulder, Colorado-based Scout Clean Energy, to build all but 30 of the originally proposed turbines.
Inslee, a Democrat, has sought to make climate initiatives central to his legacy. He is not seeking re-election after three terms in office.
The wind farm project has pitted local opponents against the state’s growing need for renewable energy since it was first proposed in 2021. In a letter to the Site Evaluation Board, Inslee noted that Washington’s energy requirements could nearly double by 2050.
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