Proposed Wind Power Project Second Public Meeting A Maine DEP First

*-The Passadumkeag Wind project is the first to go to a second public meeting under a new grid scale wind review process enacted by current DEP Commissioner Patricia Aho, who will attend the meeting, to ensure more robust public participation-*


GREENBUSH - The Maine Department of Environmental Protection will host a public meeting on Thursday, July 12 to get feedback on its draft analysis regarding a proposed 14-turbine, 42-megawatt wind farm atop Passadumkeag Ridge in Grand Falls Township.

The meeting will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Greenbush Town Office on 132 Military Road and will be attended by several DEP representatives, including Commissioner Patricia Aho, project manager Jim Beyer and other staff and contractors involved with the agency's review of the project's Site Law and Natural Resources Protection Act permit applications, including the department's noise and visual consultants.

While this is the second public meeting on the project, it's the first time the department has held two public meetings on an application to the agency as part of a new internal review process established by Commissioner Aho last year that requires two public meetings be held on all proposed grid scale wind power projects in Maine.

Developed to ensure adequate opportunity for public comment and a transparent, inclusive review of often controversial wind power projects, the new process also requires the presence of the department's Commissioner or Deputy Commissioner at that second meeting to hear the public's comments on DEP's draft analysis, which for the Passadumkeag proposal, will be available one week prior to the meeting at http://www.maine.gov/dep/ftp/WindPowerProjectFiles/Passadumkeag/

Following these second meetings, the additional comments and information heard there will be considered before a final decision is issued by the department.

As part of the application from Passadumkeag Wind Park, LLC, the proposed Passadumkeag Wind Project would include upgrading approximately 17.5 miles of existing transmission line and constructing approximately 1.5 miles of new roads for construction of and access to the project as well as a substation and an operations and maintenance building in Greenbush. The turbine portion of the project is located entirely within property currently used for commercial forestry operations and transmission lines will follow existing roads for all of the distance from the 459-foot tall turbines to the transformer.

Applications and supporting documentation for the project, which was accepted as complete for processing by the department in late February, are available at DEP's Eastern Maine Regional Office during normal working hours or online at http://www.maine.gov/dep/ftp/WindPowerProjectFiles/Passadumkeag/, as well as at the municipal office in Greenbush.

Written public comments on the application may be sent to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, 106 Hogan Road, Suite 106, Bangor, ME 04401.