SACRAMENTO, Calif. – The federal government approved a geothermal power plant near Medicine Lake in far northern California Nov. 26, reversing an earlier decision, but it required the developer to avoid sensitive areas important to several Indian tribes.
A tribal and environmental coalition already is suing to block the plan and will continue its opposition.
“It’s another betrayal by the federal government of another promise to the tribe,” said Michelle Berditschevsky, environmental coordinator for the Pit River Nation and spokeswoman for the Native Coalition for Medicine Lake Highlands Defense. “The site is extremely sacred to the tribe and has been for at least 10,000 years.”
The 48-megawatt Fourmile Hill project is needed because of the drive for more domestic and particularly more renewable energy, Assistant Secretary of the Interior Rebecca W. Watson said in announcing the decision by the Interior and Agriculture departments.
Opponents, however, noted most of the power will go to the Bonneville Power Administration, which serves Washington, Oregon and Idaho power users. Nonetheless, the California Energy Commission gave San Jose-based Calpine Corp. a $20 million grant for the project.
The approval requires Calpine to take several steps to minimize the continuing concerns of environmentalists and Indian tribes. Calpine will be required to conduct several mitigation measures, including realigning its proposed power line to reduce visual and environmental impacts. The realignment will result in a 13-mile power line for the plant to be built east of the original proposed location.
Calpine plans to build the $120 million plant at Telephone Flat, near Medicine Lake on the Modoc National Forest in Siskiyou County. A company spokesman declined immediate comment, saying the company hadn’t seen the decision.
The decision requires the company to build the power line along an existing U.S. Forest Service road, outside both the Medicine Lake Area Traditional Cultural Places District and the Mount Hoffman inventoried roadless area.
The revised project “will produce renewable energy with fewer environmental impacts,” said Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth.
Bosworth and Bureau of Land Management Director Kathleen Clarke met with tribal representatives and said they consulted extensively with the five nearby tribes, which nonetheless remain opposed to the project.
They said the tribes’ concerns persuaded the agencies to require Calpine to reduce visual and audible impacts wherever possible.
A coalition of environmental organizations and Indian tribes sued in June to block the plant. They objected to the proposed location of the transmission line, but also expressed concern about what they said would be gases, heavy metals and other minerals that would be released in steam that would rise about 200 feet above the plant.
“It’s an unfortunate reversal of the original decision made in 2000,” said Peggy Risch of the Mount Shasta Bioregional Ecology Center. “It’s clearly a victory for corporate interests.”
The plant will produce enough power for about 50,000 homes by drawing naturally heated water from the earth, then re-injecting the water to be reheated and reused. Calpine projects the plant will operate for 45 years.
The plant site is within the Glass Mountain Known Geothermal Resource Area, targeted since the 1970s as a region with significant geothermal potential. The government sold leases for geothermal development in the mid-1980s, and received the plant development proposals in 1996.
Although the surrounding area is popular with campers and snowmobilers, Calpine previously said those activities wouldn’t be disturbed by the plant.
The project is proposed for a site on the edge of a caldera, a crater caused by a collapsed shield volcano, northeast of Redding. The National Register of Historic Places has determined the caldera is eligible to be listed as a traditional cultural places district.
The Bureau of Land Management previously rejected a proposed plant within the caldera itself because it would have adverse affects on the Indian cultural values and on recreation use.
