February 23, 2010 - Southern Colorado Desert, California

Wind Farm Proposed on Boundary of Anza-Borrego Desert State Park

By Laura Cunningham and Kevin Emmerich

Pattern Energy, through Ocotillo Express LLC (OE LLC), proposes to construct, operate,
maintain and decomission a 561 megawatt (MW) wind generation facility on approximately
14,980 acres in the Ocotillo Express wind project area, with 244 wind turbines in the Imperial Valley desert, Imperial County in southern California near the border of Mexico. The turbines would be about 400 feet tall.

Draft Plan of Development from El Centro BLM (1.51 MB pdf) >>download here

If approved the project would be in operation by the end of 2012. The electricity would flow to Sunrise Powerlink, San Diego Gas and Electric Co.'s controversial transmission line from the Imperial Valley to San Diego.

Wally Leimgruber, District 5 county supervisor, said the Ocotillo Express Wind Project would advance the county's renewable energy industry.

The Sunrise Powerlink has been attacked for claiming it would carry renewable electricity, while actually connecting to many fossil fuel power plants south of the border. Early proposals would have driven the giant transmission line through Anza-Borrego State Park.

"The project scope will include a network of 16 foot wide roads that will provide access to each turbine location and to the project’s O&M building."

"During the course of construction, access roads will have an additional temporary disturbance of 20 feet to facilitate the travel of large tracked cranes. These disturbed areas will be graded and compacted for use and then decompacted and stabilized at the conclusion of the project. In addition to the crane travel paths, the underground collection system will also parallel the access road network further widening the disturbed area" (page 6 of the draft Plan of Development obtained by Basin and Range Watch).

"A total of about 20,000 gallons of water per turbine will be needed for batching
concrete. Based on the maximum of 244 turbines, a total of 5,000,000 gallons of water will be needed for turbines. In addition, approximately 15,000,000 gallons of water are expected to be required for road maintenance and dust suppression. In total, approximately 20,000,000 gallons (61.4 acre feet) of water will be needed for the project during construction. All water would be delivered from the selected source, by truck to the Batch Plant and project area. Up to 3500 vehicle trips would be required for water delivery. Temporary water storage tanks would be installed support these water needs" (page 7 POD).

Gravel and concrete aggregate would come from up to three, 15-acre locations within or near the project area.... The materials will be trucked to the batching plant and placed into stockpiles. Cement will be delivered on trucks from a source to be identified and stored in two to five silos on site. Approximately 510,000 pounds of sand, 800,000 pounds of gravel and 240,000 pounds of cement will be needed for each turbine site. Based on a maximum of 244 turbines installed, 124,500,000 pounds of sand, 195,200,000 pounds of gravel and 58,560,000 pounds of cement will be utilized. Additional sand, gravel and cement will be required for construction of the substation, switchyard and O&M facilities (page 20, POD).

Ocotillo lies near Jacumba Mountains Wilderness and Coyote Mountains Wilderness. The area is biologically rich, with Flat-tailed horned lizard (Phrynosoma mcallii), Peninsular bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis nelsoni), and Ironwood forests. The Flat-tailed horned lizard is due for a decision this November on whether it should be protected under the Endangered Species Act.

From local resident Edie Harmon, February 23, 2010: "The area around Ocotillo has an incredible glow of all shades of greens, with creosote, verbena, encelia, cheesebush, burroweed, datura, and countless small annuals up and in bloom now. Buds on cacti are abundant and look as if they will also soon be blooming. Definitely not a barren wasteland for those who are not blind and choose to open their eyes. Sure beats looking at and listening to freeway traffic for me! Guess that beauty is in the eyes and ears of the beholder. The proposed Wind Zero site almost looks golf-course green where it flooded during January and September rains, all depending on where one is standing and looking."

The turbines would be 2.3 MW Siemens at 126.5 m total height, or 1.8 MW Vestas at 125 m.

Pattern Energy also is pushing a large wind farm next to Great Basin National Park near Ely, Nevada, about a mile from a cave that shelters more than one million Brazilian free-tailed bats (our story on this project >>here).

Story in AnzaBorrego.net

ivpressonilne >>here.

PermoCo Engineering and Management >>here.

Maps and diagrams from the POD.

Ocotillo Express Wind Facility

Wind Farm Proposed on Boundary of Anza-Borrego Desert State Park