Dec. 5, 2013 – The Bureau of Land Management Rawlins Field Office is holding two public scoping meetings later this month related to Power Company of Wyoming LLC’s Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project.

The BLM is preparing a Site-Specific Environmental Assessment of PCW’s plans for Phase I Wind Turbine Development. This EA will be tiered to the BLM’s project-wide Environmental Impact Statement finalized in 2012. Phase I consists of 500 wind turbines and associated infrastructure, located within the western portions of the Chokecherry wind development area and the Sierra Madre wind development area. Each component has been micro-sited to avoid and minimize impacts to environmental resources, while maximizing the project’s efficiency.

The scoping meetings provide the public with an opportunity to learn more about PCW’s Phase I wind development and to provide input to BLM officials on what environmental concerns or issues should be addressed as they prepare the site-specific EA.

Both meetings will be held from 4 p.m.-6:30 p.m. on:

• Monday, Dec. 16, at the Jeffrey Center in Rawlins.
• Tuesday, Dec. 17, at the Platte Valley Community Center in Saratoga.

Written scoping comments also are accepted until Jan. 14, 2014, by:

• Email: BLM_WY_PCW_windfarm@blm.gov
• Mail: Bureau of Land Management, Rawlins Field Office, 1300 N. Third St., P.O. Box 2407, Rawlins, WY 82301.

The CCSM Project is an up to 1,000-turbine wind farm to be located south of Sinclair and Rawlins in Carbon County, Wyoming. The project’s long-term surface disturbance will be less than 2,000 acres of a 320,000-acre ranch. With a nameplate capacity of up to 3,000 megawatts, this wind energy project will ensure a reliable, cost-effective supply of renewable electricity that’s unmatched in the West. The CCSM Project site was authorized in a Record of Decision signed Oct. 9, 2012, by then-Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. The CCSM Project wind turbines are being developed in two phases.

BLM also is working on a Site-Specific Environmental Assessment of the project’s infrastructure components. Public scoping meetings for that first EA were held in September. For more information, visit PCW’s Site-Specific EA1 Document Archive.

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