Low Impact Hydropower Institute
34 Providence Street
Portland, ME 04103
Tel. (207) 773-8190 · Fax (206) 984-3086
www.lowimpacthydro.org
MEMORANDUM
To: LIHI Governing Board
From: Fred Ayer
Date: February 23, 2007
Subject: Follow-up to minimum flow issue by LIHI Staff West Branch St. Regis Hydroelectric Project Certification
This memo is the record of contacts I’ve made since we received a request from Brookfield Power (formally Brascan) to remove the suspension the West Branch St. Regis Certificate Application. As you can see from these contact summaries and the information that I sent you last week, Brookfield met with the other parties and they have resolved this issue to FERC’s satisfaction. The purpose of these follow-up contacts is to make sure that the resolution was satisfactory for the other parties.
RECORD OF CONTACTS
Date of Conversation: February 20, 2007 and April 11, 2007
LIHI Staff Reviewer: Fred Ayer
Person Contacted: Tom Skutnik, Brookfield Project Mgr.
Telephone: (315) 413-2789
email:
In a phone conversation with Tom, he brought me up to date with the resolution of the low flow issues that occurred during late summer 2005. As you may recall Brookfield met with the resource agencies and NY Rivers United and came to an agreement that was filed with FERC. FERC issued a three page letter describing and approving the settlement. I asked Tom to send me a copy of the FERC correspondence which he did the same day. I told him I would update the Board and make follow-up calls to the parties to confirm that they were satisfied with the resolution. I also told Tom, since this was the only outstanding issue, I was going to request that the LIHI Board deliberate and vote electronically to reinstate the certification for the project.
I spoke with Tom a second time in April to explain the delay in processing due to the inability of Bruce Carpenter and I to connect. I also discussed Bruce’s request for reinforcing conditions regarding land transfer and the term of monitoring.
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Date of Conversation: February , 2007
LIHI Staff Reviewer: Fred Ayer
Person Contacted: Steve Patch, Project Biologist, USFWS Cortland Field Office
Telephone: (607) 753-9334
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Date of Conversation: February 23, and April 10, 2007
LIHI Staff Reviewer: Fred Ayer
Person Contacted: Bruce Carpenter, NY Rivers United
Telephone: (315) 413-2790
I spoke briefly with Bruce and he was pretty sure that the resolution was satisfactory, but needed to check with Brookfield about a related issue associated with the minimum flow violation. He planned on calling back late Friday, but did not. I will follow-up with Bruce next week. It wasn’t until April 10th that Bruce and I reconnected and he wanted to make sure that we reinforce language in the original settlement agreement related to a land transfer and the settlement agreement associated with the minimum flow violation regarding monitoring.
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Date of Conversation: April 12, 2007
Application Reviewer: Fred Ayer
Person Contacted: Alice Richardson, DEC Region 6 Hydro Coordinator
Telephone/email: 315-785-2267
Areas of Expertise: License and Settlement Agreement, flows, recreation and access
Alice talked about the St. Regis flow issue and the resolution of the issue. She was comfortable where things were but said that there was still a field observation that has not taken place yet, because the applicant is doing required penstock repairs and it is difficult to get the flow low enough to test the new flow monitoring devices. She believes that the applicant will schedule the field tests once they can control flow. She also suggested that I contact Frank Flack (315-785-2258) at the NYDEC, who is in the fisheries area. She transferred me to Frank and we had a discussion about the project and he was comfortable that the issue had been resolved, but also wanted to reinforce that the field test had not been completed, but he was quite sure the problem had been solved. He suggested I talk with William Wellman, TU, who is TU’s rep in the project area. I called Mr. Wellman and he asked me to send him a copy of the FERC letter. I did and he in turn redistributed it to TU members with a stake in the process and resolution of the minimum flow violation. The sense was that the fishery staff at the state and TU supported certifying the project. The TU folks are excited about the stocking of the trout.
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