Zephyr Transmission Project

[Marty Lowe]

This is not a 17M kite discussion, but a power line construction project that will transfer wind turbine power from Wyoming to Las Vegas.
Utah wind riders interest in this comes mainly from the line location around Strawberry Reservoir.

As far as I know, Pepe first brought this to light and Billy felt we should have a presence at the open house in Heber tonight, 4/18.
Billy is recouping from surfer ear surgery so John Guay and Myself attended the open house.
John may have some other comments on the Open House, and please correct me if I posted anything inaccurate.

They were very receptive to having recreation based comments.

I'm happy to report that as of now, in my opinion, we will not be affected by this project.

The power lines will parallel existing power lines that are east and south of areas that we mainly use.
Even in the back country past the cabins and even for the few that venture into the far south east regions of the hills around Strawberry, I see no issues.

I will bring some comment, mail in forms to the UWA meeting 5/2 and some literature and maps.
It can all be accessed on the web site below also.

The maps on the web sit do not show that they will run by existing large power lines that are in place now,
The maps at the open house were better at showing the parallel line situation.
These existing power lines are not the small lines like the lines by the cabins now.
Personally, I have been pretty far back by the far end of the reservoir, to the south and east and have never noticed the existing lines.

http://www.datcllc.com/datc-projects/zephyr/

http://www.datcllc.com/

Marty

[brian.doubek]

Thanks John and Marty for representing us at the Zephyr meeting. I know of two other transmission line projects in the works that could potentially run by strawberry and also through areas of skyline which could affect snowkiting. All 3 of these projects are competing for roughly the same route and the Zephyr is most likely the last one to be built as it is still early in the NEPA permitting process. I work for an environmental consulting company as a GIS(geographic information systems) analyst and, I make these maps shown below and the maps that go to the public scoping meetings like you saw last night. They do take recreation seriously as resource the might be impacted by these transmission lines so it is good to show up to the public meetings and fill out comment forms. Every one of the comments is reviewed and addressed as part of the NEPA permitting process.

The project I am currently working on is being built by Rocky Mountain Power, it's called Energy Gateway South, here is a pdf:
http://www.pacificorp.com/content/dam/pacificorp/doc/Transmission/Transmission_Projects/EGS_RMP_ScopResults_11x17_111025_2.pdf
and a KMZ (google earth)
http://www.gatewaysouthproject.com/EGSPhase2.kmz

Another project called TransWest Express is also in the works,

http://www.transwestexpress.net/about/maps.shtml