September 2, 2017
New York

Wind developer hosts second round of open houses for Mad River Wind Farm

By Marcus Wolf | Watertown Daily Times | September 2, 2017 | www.watertowndailytimes.com

Wind farm developer Avangrid Renewables will showcase its proposed Mad River Wind Farm and the progress the development team has made later this month during its second round of open houses for the project.

The development team behind the proposed 350-megawatt project in the towns of Worth, Jefferson County, and Redfield, Oswego County, plan to host open houses this month: one from 2 to 4 p.m. and one from 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 20 at the Lorraine Volunteer Fire Department, 20876 County Route 189, and another two with the same times Sept. 21 at the Redfield Volunteer Fire Department, 4879 County Route 17. Avangrid previously hosted two public house sessions in March at the Redfield Fire Department.

Attendees will have a chance to learn about the current scope of Avangrid’s project, the environmental studies the developer will need to have conducted and the permitting, engineering construction and interconnection processes for wind energy facilities, said Paul N. Copleman, communications manager for Avangrid, in an email.

“We are excited to keep working together on what we think is a good site to create lasting economic opportunities for the area,” Mr. Copleman said.

Avangrid and its subsidiary, Atlantic Wind LLC, plan to build up to 125 turbines that will cover an about 200-acre footprint within an about 20,000-acre plot of working forest it leased from Salmon River Timberlands LLC, plans Mr. Copleman said haven’t changed since the development team’s previous open houses.

Mr. Copleman said the team behind the project has taken further steps in the development process, installing four more metrological towers since October for a total of six towers and by conducting preliminary environmental reviews, which he said includes wetlands assessment. Mr. Copleman said Avangrid plans to submit a preliminary scoping statement late this year or early next year, the next key step for the developer in the state law Article 10 review process for its project .

Beyond submitting a scoping statement, Mr. Copleman said “All forward-looking timelines are speculative, but make an effort to incorporate the time expected for studies and the Article 10 process.”

The developer recently revisited the proposed design for its Horse Creek Wind Farm project planned for construction in the towns of Clayton, Orleans, Brownville and Lyme and considered reducing its scope after discovering that the state electric grid couldn’t support it.

Mr. Copleman said the decision has no effect on the developer’s plans for Mad River Wind Farm or its other projects because the decision was based on the specific location the developer would want to interconnect the Horse Creek Wind Farm to and that location’s available space and infrastructure.

“In order for us to ‘plug in’ to the energy grid, NYISO (the New York Independent System Operator) has to determine that the wind farm would pose no threat to the reliability of the system,” Mr. Copleman said. “If they determine that the wind farm would somehow pose a problem, we either can’t build the wind farm at all, or have to undertake the full cost ourselves of making the necessary infrastructure upgrades to the energy grid to fully resolve the problem.”

[rest of article available at source]


URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2017/09/02/wind-developer-hosts-second-round-of-open-houses-for-mad-river-wind-farm/