by DON THOMPSON, Associated
Press Writer
19 May 2004
SACRAMENTO (AP) --
Environmental groups have sued the federal government over geothermal projects
it has approved in the remote Medicine Lake Highlands region considered sacred
by Indian tribes.
The suit, filed Tuesday
and announced Wednesday, challenges approval of the first two geothermal power
plants proposed by Calpine Corp. Both would be built within the Medicine Lake
caldera, the remnant of an ancient volcano 30 miles east of Mt. Shasta and 10
miles south of the Lava Beds National Monument in northeastern California.
The four environmental
coalitions that filed the suit in Sacramento federal court contend the power
projects at Fourmile Hill and Telephone Flat would turn an otherwise scenic
natural area into "an ugly, noisy, stinking industrial wasteland."
A Forest Service
spokesman declined comment, citing the pending suit. Calpine officials had no
immediate reaction, and a BLM spokesman did not immediately return a telephone
message from The Associated Press.
The projects would
include erecting 150-foot high drilling rigs, nine-story power plants on 15-acre
pads, and seven-story cooling towers capped by steam plumes; excavating
750,000-gallon toxic waste sumps; and crisscrossing the area with roads,
high-tension transmission lines and pipelines. Trucks and drilling equipment
would break the normal solitude, the groups allege.
They allege Calpine's
plans to inject "highly toxic acids" into the geothermal wells to
increase production would pollute groundwater and endanger Medicine Lake and the
Fall Rivers trout and other wildlife.
The 45-year project
would be subsidized by more than $50 million from taxpayers through the
California Energy Commission, but the resulting 98 megawatts would be sold to
the Bonneville Power Administration in Oregon for use outside of California, the
suit objects.
The suit was filed by
the Save Medicine Lake Coalition, comprised of the Medicine Lake Citizens for
Quality Environment, Klamath Forest Alliance, California Wilderness Coalition
and Fall River Wild Trout Foundation.
It accuses the Bureau
of Land Management, which approved the leases, and the Forest Service, which has
the land on which the projects sit, of violating various federal laws by
granting approval. Calpine, of San Jose, also is named in the suit.
The government's
environmental impact statement never properly addressed the underlying issue of
whether geothermal development outweighed the benefits of maintaining the region
for wildlife and human enjoyment, said the environmental groups' attorney,
Stephan Volker.
The government first
disapproved the Telephone Flat project in 2000, then reevaluated its decision
and approved the project in November 2002 as part of a lawsuit settlement.
©2004 Associated Press
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