ALBANY — The New York State Board on Electric Generation Siting and the Environment (Siting Board) today announced it would hold public statement hearings in the Village of Lowville (Lewis County) to receive comments on the Atlantic Wind LLC (Atlantic Wind) proposal to build and operate a 101.4 megawatt (MW) wind energy project in the Towns of Pinckney and Harrisburg in Lewis County. The project would interconnect to the electrical grid along National Grid’s Lighthouse Hill to the Black River 115 kilovolt (kV) transmission line in the Town of Rodman.

The proposed facility, the Deer River Wind Energy project, is a wind energy project that would include up to 25 wind turbines with associated underground and overhead collection lines, access roads, a meteorological tower, an operations and maintenance building, a collection substation, a point of interconnection switchyard, and a temporary laydown yard/batch plant.

Opportunities for public information and comment will be held, as follows:

In addition to the August 6 informational forums and public statement hearings a procedural conference will be held before the Administrative Law Judges James A. Costello of the Department of Public Service and Daniel P. O’Connell of the Department of Environmental Conservation, at 10 a.m. on August 7, 2019 at the Harrisburg Town Hall, 7886 Cobb Road, Copenhagen, NY 13626.

At the informational forums, an overview of the Siting Board's certification process will be provided. Atlantic Wind will then present a brief summary of the proposed project and will have maps of the proposed project area available for viewing. Members of the public will then have an opportunity to pose questions about the process and the certificate application pending before the Siting Board.

At the hearing, any person wishing to provide a public statement must complete a request card which will be used to call each person who has requested to provide a statement. The hearing will continue until everyone wishing to speak has been heard or other reasonable arrangements have been made. Reasonable time limits may be set for each speaker as necessary to afford all attendees an opportunity to be heard. Lengthy comments may be submitted in writing and summarized for oral presentation. A verbatim transcript of the hearing will be made for inclusion in the record of this case.

Persons with disabilities requiring special accommodations should call the Department of Public Service’s Human Resources Management Office at (518) 474-2520 as soon as possible. TDD users may request a sign language interpreter by placing a call through the New York Relay Service at 711. Individuals with difficulty understanding or reading English are encouraged to call the Department at 1-800-342-3377 for free language assistance services regarding this notice.

The application may be reviewed online at the Siting Board web page (http://www.dps.ny.gov/SitingBoard), by following the link to “Projects Under Review,” on the left side of the page. The application is also available for review at local public libraries in the project vicinity.

Other Ways to Comment

For those who cannot attend or prefer not to speak at a public statement hearing, there are several other ways to provide your comments to the Siting Board. Comments should refer to “Case 16-F-0267.”  Although comments will be accepted throughout the pendency of this proceeding, they are requested by October 4, 2019.

Via the Internet or Mail: The public may enter comments directly into the case file from the Department of Public Service website, www.dps.ny.gov, by clicking on "Search" at the top of the page and then entering “16-F-0267” into the “Search by Case Number” field. In the open case, access the screen to enter comments by clicking on the "Post Comments" box at the top right of the page. Comments may also be submitted electronically to the Hon. Kathleen H. Burgess, Secretary, at secretary@dps.ny.gov, or by mail or delivery to Secretary Burgess at the New York State Board on Electric Generation Siting and the Environment, Three Empire State Plaza, Albany, New York 12223-1350. All written comments will become part of the record considered by the Siting Board and can be read on the website by searching by the case number, as described above, and clicking on the “Public Comments” tab.

Toll-Free Opinion Line: Individuals may choose to submit comments by calling the Department of Public Service’s Opinion Line at 1-800-335-2120. This line is set up to receive in-state calls 24hours a day. These calls are not transcribed but a summary is provided to the presiding Examiners, who will report to the Siting Board.