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Sunrise alternative continues
to threaten Back Country
By Christy Scott
The Alpine Sun
Slicing through the hearts of Jacumba,
Boulevard, Campo, and Alpine, the modified route D alternative
is emerging as a possible recommendation in the Environmental
Impact Report for San Diego Gas & Electric’s Sunrise Powerlink
project.
In the beginning, the Powerlink was planned to run
through Anza Borrego Desert State Park. State park officials and
environmentalists objected, and many questioned the need for the
line. The 150-mile, $1.3 billion, 500 kilovolt powerline would
start in the Imperial Valley, where wind and solar energy are
expected to be developed; cut through the middle of Anza
Borrego; and end at a substation near Del Mar.
The California Public Utilities Commission directed SDG&E
to come up with alternative routes that would not go through the
park. “They want us to find a route that doesn’t go through the
Anza-Borrego State Park,” said SDG&E representative Nick Pince
to residents in Campo last year.
So, in March, the CPUC settled on three alternatives —
each running through the Cleveland National Forest. Then
national forest managers objected, as any of these routes would
have forced a redrawing of the Forest Management Plan, which
could potentially take up to two years.
Initially recommended by the U.S. Forest Service, the
CPUC came up with Modified Route D, and public outcry and
pressure against the Anza-Borrego route has driven Aspen
Environmental Group, which is conducting the EIR for the CPUC,
to look hard at this previously obscure proposal, that meanders
all around the Back Country for the most part south of
Interstate 8.
Modified route D would plant 125-foot tall conduit
towers along a path that would skirt Cleveland National Forest;
but travel right through Boulevard, Campo, Potrero, north
through Descanso and west through the heart of Alpine, where it
would be undergrounded along Alpine Boulevard from West Willows
to Peutz Valley Road.
While SDG&E officials have any southern route is
undesirable, due to the proximity to the Southwest Powerlink,
that has been knocked out 23 times in the past decade due to
fire, now they are saying that if the CPUC/BLM decides that the
southern Modified Route D is the best, they will likely go with
it.
“If this route is what the CPUC decides once the EIR is
complete, it could end up being the one we go with,” said SDG&E
representative Lynn Trexel, Principal Land Advisor for the
project.
The project EIR, which was due to be released last
month, has been postponed until January. The final CPUC/BLM
decision on the project is expected in June 2008.
MEGAMAD about alts
While the current comment period for the entire
powerlink project is closed, a group of local business-people
has pushed the CPUC/BLM to reopen the comment period for the
modified route D until Oct. 8.
Mountain Empire Groups against Modified Alternative D (MEGAMAD)
is made up of the Campo-Lake Morena Business Association, Lake
Morena Village Council, H.O.P.E. of the Mountain Empire, and the
Campo Gentlemen’s Club.
MEGAMAD is also sponsoring a town hall meeting at the
Lake Morena Community Church at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 27,
to discuss the route. Representatives from SDG&E, the CPUC and
the BLM have all been invited to the town hall meeting. |
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Voicing your opinion
For more information about the Sunrise Powerlink
Modified Route D check online at
http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/environment/info/aspen/sunrise/addl_alt_may2007.pdf.
All comments must include your name and return address.
Send e-mail comments to
sunrise@aspeneg.com, or by fax to (866) 711-3106. To
submit comments by mail address to: Billie Blanchard, CPUC/Lynda
Kastoll, BLM, c/o Aspen Environmental Group, 235 Montgomery
Street, Suite 935, San Francisco, CA 94104-3002.
 E-mail
Christy Scott
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