Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD) officials stopped in coastal communities last week for five public meetings, one of those held in Brookings, designed to explain a state-conducted review of a federal proposal to lease two offshore areas for the purpose of exploring wind energy development.
The northernmost area is northwest of Coos Bay between Reedsport and Florence. The southernmost area is directly west of Brookings. Andy Lanier, Marine Affairs Coordinator with Oregon DLCD explained that the process is still in its early stages.
“We are not at the stage where a project is being proposed,” Lanier stated. “That’s still years down the road.”
It was explained that the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) completed a draft assessment of potential impacts that would be caused by the issuance of a lease. Such a lease would allow a developer to study whether wind energy is feasible there.
“They would not be able to build anything until BOEM approves a construction operations plan,” Jeff Burright, DLDC state/federal relations coordinator, said later. “When a lessee submits a plan to BOEM for their approval, BOEM needs the state to review that before they can act, so we would get a second Federal Consistency Review opportunity.”
The environmental impact of a lease would be that it would give lessees right of way and right of use to install and maintain buoys, SONAR and monitoring equipment to help examine the viability of developing wind energy in two areas. According to the BOEM assessment, buoys would not be visible from shore, while onshore impacts would be increased boat traffic in those areas. It would also allow ocean floor and core sampling, biological and geophysical studies to happen there.
The players
As with many proposed governmental/environmental actions, the number of involved regulatory agencies can become overwhelming and confusing and this is no different. The 80-page draft Environmental Assessment presented contained a list of 134 acronyms, 39 or which are government agencies, government documents or legislative actions.
The (federal) Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI). BOEM prepared an environmental assessment which looked at whether issuing leases in Wind Energy Areas (WEA).
House Bill 3375, passed in 2021, directed agencies to look at the possibility of developing offshore wind energy, directing the Oregon Department of Energy (ODE), in consultation with the state Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD), to examine the planning goal of creating 3 gigawatts of offshore energy by 2030.
The Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development then has the authority and responsibility to oversee federal processes that have foreseeable effects on the region.
Meanwhile, Rogue Climate Team, a citizen’s group, made up of a range of specialties, formed a prospective plan to examine and explain the size, duration and scale of an offshore wind energy project on Oregon’s outer continental shelf. However, since the citizens group did not develop their recommendations through a public process with public input, DLCD embarked on a public process to inform the public and collect input. DLDC officials also spoke at a Florence City Council work session June 7 before the public meeting. Two other meetings to collect public comment were held in Brookings and Coos Bay.
The assessment
BOEM’s draft environmental assessment concludes that leases would cause negligible impacts on geological areas, air quality socioeconomics, fishing, recreation and tourism.
Impacts would be negligible and temporary regarding historic properties, the assessment reads. Moderate impacts were predicted for marine and coastal habitats, marine mammals and sea turtles and coastal and marine birds.
Impacts to Native American tribes and tribal resources was predicted to be “minor and temporary.”
Burright explained that it’s still possible that DLDC may look at proposals and determine they are not consistent with state policies and deny the project.
“If the state were to object, the federal agency can’t move forward, unless, after they look at our objections, they take another look at their actions and look at the standards they have to meet, which is consistent to the maximum extent practical. If they think they have met that standard, they can send us a letter saying ‘we’re going to move forward anyway and if the state is not satisfied, our remedy is to challenge that in court.”
Burright explained that three processes are occurring concurrently, including the DLDC review.
“BOEM also has two other process that are open for public comment right now,” he said, mentioning the draft assessment of impacts related to lease issuance and subsequent studies.
“If they got some sort of concurrence from the state and move forward, they would finalize their environmental assessment by the end of July, their plan would be to have an auction around the end of October of this year and then, their plan would be to issue leases in these two areas by December of this year.”
He said lessee would then “go out and study what they just bought.” He said meteorological buoys would be placed in those areas and developers would look for cable corridors and do floor sampling. He said boat traffic would be the biggest impact but researchers would also be looking to find places to connect cables from turbines to the grid.
He said it’s estimated those studies would take about five years. However, until a developer completes the studies, submits a plan to BOEM and that plan is shared with the state for further review, it won’t be known what is actually proposed for the final construction, he said.
Asked how the proposed wind energy areas were determined, it was explained that wind speed monitors have been placed in many areas along the coast. Based on readings, the two areas were determined to have the highest sustained winds and could use less geographical area to meet the needed output. However, one commenter called the selection of areas, predatory, suggesting that wind farms are usually placed by rural areas.
Some confusion, concern
Other members of the audience seemed confused
about the purpose of the meeting, one incorrectly suggesting that DLDC wants to install wind farms, when it’s actually reviewing a BOEM proposal to examine the
viability of wind energy.
Another commenter incorrectly asserted that BOEM’s draft assessment is essentially a written plan to install wind farms, which
can’t be changed now that it’s been submitted in writing. It
was noted at the meeting
that DLDC is only reviewing
the BOEM process for compliance with state law,
that the BOEM draft assessment is not a plan but its determination of potential impacts that could be caused by the lease issuance and subsequent investigation.
Sadie Carnie, communications manager for DLDC, said public concerns were similar at the Newport meeting the next night.
While the meeting was scheduled to glean comments on the lease proposal, people expressed concerns about the potential final outcome of wind farms off the coast.
“BOEM has not submitted a proposal that is reflective of that,” she said. “They’re saying, ‘no, that’s not a reasonably foreseeable outcome, we have all this work left to do.’ I would say… people are very concerned about the outcome and I can understand why. A few meteorological buoys is not a very big issue but what’s down the road would have a big impact.”
Public comment
Carnie said Rep. David Gomberg attended the Florence meeting and suggested that DLDC consider all the public comments provided to BOEM as part of their review. She said the meetings in Florence and Newport both featured comments on behalf of union employees, engineers, and environmental groups.
District 9 Rep. Boomer Wright attended the Florence meeting and said while he wished a spokesperson from BOEM would have been present, he also supported having state oversight of the proposed project.
“I firmly believe that sometimes, the federal government, in their interest to supposedly do the common good, sometimes that good doesn’t get down to the common,” he said to DLCD. “My expectation is that you are going to be that buffer and work very hard to support what we believe needs to be done or not done.”
Although the meeting asked for public comment regarding the lease issuance, most commenters chose to speak about wind farms.
Kathy McCullough said she lived inland where a Pacific Gas and Electric wind farm was built, adding that she was excited at the prospect until they were constructed. She said that once the giant turbines were operational, they were not maintained, causing them to lose large parts and leak oil and hydraulic fluid over a large area. She said that despite requests to fix them, the leaky turbines are spreading oil over a large area and losing bolts, doors and parts.
“I don’t think it’s going to be any different over the ocean,” she said. “I can’t imagine what our water is going to look like… this is a bad idea, just horrible.”
Commenter Brian Hudson questioned the total cost versus output of offshore wind farms, suggesting that onshore power users would be forced to pay much higher costs for the power. He added that ocean air rots metal and aluminum quickly.
Leroy Bigley said he’s been a fisherman for 70 years and that it took fisherman 30 years to change the state’s mind on fisheries.
“You can do all the surveys you want.” he said, asserting that NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) regularly changes its assessments. Expressing distaste for government and environmentalists, he called the effort a waste of time.
Sport fisherman Dennis Dinsmore said he’s been on the coast his whole life and that on rough days, boats cannot go out to service or maintain turbines.
He questioned who would clean up petroleum fluids if a turbine should fail and cause a spill. He also questioned whether the onshore grid would be ready to handle the extra load of electricity produced by the wind farms.
Commenter Nate Stokes said he has been tracking offshore wind projects, which he felt would help America reach a cleaner future. He said development would also create many new engineering jobs, along with construction, maintenance and supply chain trades. He said he felt the development would enhance the coastal economy and last well into the future.
Representing Rogue Climate Team, Ashley Audycki said that while the group supports clean energy, it’s concerned about potential unintended consequences. She encouraged locals to share knowledge of the region to fill gaps in information about the area, its people and its economies.
Jay Guettler said he sees a trend where maintenance is not included in plans to develop wind energy. He said no monitoring happens after installation. He suggested making maintenance and decommission part of the process in order to avoid having decomposing wind turbines left out on the ocean.
The deadline for public comment on the lease proposal ended June 15.
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